University  of  California  •  Berkeley 


THE  VENGEANCE 
OF  THE  GODS 

AND  THREE  OTHER  STORIES  OF  REAL 
AMERICAN  COLOR  LINE  LIFE 

By  WILLIAM  PICKENS 
Author  of  "The  Heir  of  Slaves"  "The  New  Negro,"  Etc. 

Introduction   by 

Bishop  John  Hurst,  D.D.,  LL.D. 
of  the  African  Methodist  Episcopal  Church 


PUBLISHED   BY 

THE  A.  M.  E.  BOOK  CONCERN 

631     PINE     STREET 
PHILADELPHIA,  PA. 


Copyright,   1922 

By  WILLIAM  PICKENS 

All  rights  reserved 


INTRODUCTION 

By  Bishop  John  Hurst 

One  of  the  hardest  things  in  the  world  to  accom 
plish  is  to  get  rid  of  a  fixed  idea.  The  fixed  idea 
frequently  is  the  lunacy  of  otherwise  sane  minds. 
When  good,  it  is  beneficial  in  its  workings.  When 
evil,  it  is  destructive  and  the  injuries  it  commits 
know  no  bounds. 

The  fact  that  a  man  differs  in  physical  traits 
from  another  does  not  establish  his  superiority. 
Things  external  in  human  relations  have  but  scant 
value.  The  refining  and  spiritualizing  forces  are 
those  that  count.  It  is  a  tremendously  big  price  to 
pay  if,  in  order  to  prove  his  superiority,  a  fellow 
has  to  resort  to  sharp  practices,  immoral  schemes 
and  brutalizing  standards.  He  is  deteriorating 
without  knowing  it.  Germany  aimed  for  a  com 
manding  position  in  the  world  through  material 
success  and  military  and  individual  efficiency.  Her 
leaders  were  obsessed  with  the  idea  of  proving 
by  those  means  their  superiority  over  everybody 
else.  They  started  as  if  to  say,  in  effect,  "Watch 
us  put  it  over.  See  whether  we  do  not  build  up  a 
model  system  producing  the  finest  result  attained 
anywhere  in  commerce  and  industry — whether  we 
do  not  make  Germany  the  leader  of  modern  civ 
ilization — the  most  powerful  nation  ever  known 
to  man."  It  took  them  fifty  years  to  put  the  scheme 


4  Introduction 

through,  but  they  woke  up  to  find  all  of  it  but 
illusions  and  short-sightedness.  Now  they  are  be 
ing  un-educated  from  this  foible,  from  this  false 
conception  of  life.  There  is  hope  for  them. 

But  the  process  of  un-educating  one's  self  from 
old  habits  and  false  notions  and  prejudices  of  many 
centuries  is  most  difficult.  People  thus  affected 
are  frequently  found  reversing  themselves.  It  is 
a  work  of  slow  growth  and  almost  interminable. 
They  need  light  and  more  of  it  every  day.  Writers 
who  devote  their  talent  in  furnishing  material  to 
meet  this  condition  render  double  service :  they 
help  the  blind  out  of  his  dungeon  and  build  up  hope 
and  expectation  of  a  brighter  day  in  the  breast  of 
the  sufferer.  They  are  entitled  to  the  encourage 
ment  and  respect  of  those  whom  they  serve.  The 
colored  people  must  learn  more  and  more  to  sup 
port  them  and,  by  that  means,  hasten  the  dawn  of 
the  social  and  spiritual  redemption  of  mankind. 

This  small  volume  of  stories  explodes  in  a  viva 
cious  and  engaging  style,  for  which  its  author  is 
so  well  known,  the  false  philosophic  and  scientific 
value  of  the  doctrine  of  Race  Superiority  and  the 
way  it  demonstrates  itself.  The  author  points  out 
with  great  appositeness  the  base  and  abject  leveJ 
to  which  its  advocates  and  patrons  will  descend 
to  maintain  and  prove  their  thesis,  but,  invariably, 
with  sinister  results  to  themselves.  We  believe 
and  trust  that  it  will  meet  with  a  hearty  welcome 
by  all. 


CONTENTS 

INTRODUCTION  3 

FOREWORD 7 

THE  VENGEANCE  OF  THE  GODS 11 

THE  SUPERIOR  RACE  87 

PASSING  THE  BUCK   105 

TIT  FOR  TAT   .  ..117 


FOREWORD 

Painter  and  Picture 

Who  paints  the  picture,  paints  himself  beautiful. 
Colored  people  often  complain  that  in  American 
literature  the  Negro  characters  are  made  either 
hideous  or  undesirable  or  unheroic.  The  colored 
people  did  not  make  that  literature.  People  do  not 
present  another  race  as  beautiful  and  heroic,  un 
less  that  race  is  far  removed  from  them  in  time  or 
space;  or  unless,  as  in  the  case  of  the  white  man 
and  the  American  Indian,  the  stronger  race  has 
killed  off  the  weaker  and  removed  it  as  a  rival. 
The  20th  century  white  man  can  speak  romanti 
cally  of  the  Indians, — of  Indian  courage,  Indian  war 
and  Indian  love.  But  to  the  18th  century  white 
man,  whom  the  Indian  menaced  from  the  neigh 
boring  plains,  there  was  "no  good  Indian  but  a  dead 
Indian." 

If  the  Negro  wants  to  be  idealized  in  a  world 
where  the  Negro  is  a  considerable  potential  factor, 
he  must  idealize  himself, — or  else  he  must  expect  a 
sorry  role  in  every  tale  from  "Mother  Goose"  to 
Wells'  "Outline  of  History."  It  is  not  simply  that 
the  white  story  teller  will  not  do  full  justice  to  the 
humanity  of  the  black  race;  he  cannot.  A  race 
must  present  its  own  case  and  ennoble  its  own 
ideals. 


8  Foreword 

The  custom  of  representing  the  Negro  in  story 
as  either  a  clown  or  a  villain,  or  else  a  faithful  and 
useful  servant  to  some  white  person,  has  been  so 
universal  that  even  the  earlier  Negro  writers  dared 
not  venture  beyond  it,  especially  when  they  were 
dependent  /upon  white  publishers.  The  colored 
writer  is  now  beginning  to  present  his  race  un- 
apologetically  and  with  the  full  attributes  of  MAN. 

When  the  small  boy  saw  on  the  walls  of  his  home 
a  painting  representing  a  man  as  mastering  and 
subduing  with  his  bare  hands  a  strong  lion,  the 
child  asked:  "Mother,  how  can  that  man  whip  the 
lion  so  easily?  Every  time  I  read  about  lions  in 
Africa  or  see  them  at  the  circus,  hundreds  of  peo 
ple  are  afraid  of  one  lion."  His  mother  gave  him 
the  full  explanation :  "My  son,  it  is  like  this :  those 
lions  did  not  paint  that  picture." 

But  we  are  not  writing  an  essay  on  story-tell 
ing;  we  are  simply  presenting  to  the  reader  the 
four  stories  of  this  little  book,  with  the  statement 
that  the  colored  characters  are  so  completely  hu 
man  that  some  people  would  consider  them  un 
natural. 

The  first  is  "The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods."  The 
author  must  do  most  of  such  work  on  the  road 
and  in  railway  trains, — on  his  knee  in  Jim  Crow 
cars  or  on  a  table  in  Pullman.  This  particular 
story  was  written  on  a  circle  tour  of  the  far  west. 
The  first  chapter  was  written  in  Spokane,  Wash 
ington,  and  the  last  in  Indianapolis,  Indiana;  the 


Foreword  9 

intervening  chapters  or  parts  of  them  in  Tacoma, 
Portland,  Sacramento,  Oakland,  San  Francisco, 
San  Jose,  Vallejo,  Los  Angeles,  San  Diego,  Phoe 
nix,  Albuquerque,  El  Paso  and  other  points  in 
Texas,  and  in  Arkansas.  It  recalls  many  of  the 
author's  boyhood  recollections  of  the  peonage- 
infested  districts  of  the  last  named  state. 

The  second  story,  "The  Superior  Race,"  was  writ 
ten  after  the  author  had  had  a  considerable  sea 
voyage.  The  scene  is  laid  in  Mobile  Bay  and  the 
Gulf  of  Mexico,  and  is  built  around  an  incident  that 
was  related  to  him. 

The  third  story,  "Passing  the  Buck,"  was  orig 
inally  called  "Trapped/'  It  contains  incidents 
which  will  be  remembered  by  many  people  who 
attended  the  great  Methodist  Centenary  Celebra 
tion  in  Columbus,  Ohio,  1919.  It  was  written  one 
morning  in  a  Pullman  car  crossing  the  desert  of 
the  Dakotas  and  Wyoming. 

The  last  story,  "Tit  for  Tat,"  relates  what  ac 
tually  happened  in  the  life  of  a  colored  regiment 
from  Illinois  while  it  was  seeing  service  in  France. 
The  substance  of  this  story  was  given  me  by  a 
former  high  officer  of  that  regiment  in  a  conver 
sation  at  the  Appomattox  Club  in  Chicago. 

All  of  these  stories  are  facts  and  types,  but  not 
of  the  kind  that  the  white  American  will  yet  be 
enthusiastic  about  printing,  although  he  may  read 
them.  WILLIAM  PICKEMS 

260  W.  139th  St.,  New  York,  N.  Y. 


THE  VENGEANCE  OF  THE  GODS 
Blood  or  Opportunity? 


CHAPTER  I. 

"TWO  TWINS" 

There  is  an  old  unsettled  war  'twixt  blood  and 
chance.  Heredity  or  environment?  Which  has 
the  major  influence  on  the  destinies  of  men? 

The  unnatural  social  and  the  illegitimate  sex  re 
lations  of  white  and  colored  people  in  the  United 
States  furnish  the  best  body  of  material  through 
which  to  investigate  this  problem.  One  of  the 
best  illustrations  of  the  power  of  environment  and 
at  the  same  time  the  persistency  of  blood,  hails 
from  the  river  lands  of  the  State  of  Arkansas. 

John  Elliot  was  a  wealthy  plantation  owner. 
He  held  title  to  many  thousand  acres  of  fertile 
cotton  lands  of  eastern  Arkansas  in  the  last  decade 
of  the  nineteenth  century.  His  farms  were  worked 
by  scores  of  Negro  families,  most  of  whom  had 
migrated  from  the  Carolinas  and  Georgia  in  the 
eighties.  Elliot  had  advanced  the  railroad  fares 
to  these  families  through  his  labor  agents  who  op 
erated  in  the  older  states.  The  heads  of  these 
families  had  "made  their  mark"  or  signed  their 


12  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

names  to  contracts  for  their  entire  families  to 
"work  out"  these  debts  on  Elliot's  estate.  These 
contracts  were  made  and  signed  through  agents 
in  the  older  states,  and  the  "parties  of  the  second 
part"  had  no  knowledge  of  the  conditions  of  the 
work  to  be  required,  beyond  the  general  under 
standing  that  it  was  farm  labor. 

Of  course,  Elliot  had  to  furnish  these  "new 
comers"  their  "rations."  For  most  of  them  came 
west  in  the  winter,  after  the  close  of  the  farming 
season  in  the  east;  and  accordingly  they  had  to  be 
supplied  with  food  and  clothing  at  the  expense  of 
the  new  landlord  even  before  steady  work  should 
begin  in  the  spring.  This  caused  the  debt  against 
them  to  mount  rapidly,  for  the  landlord  charged 
these  supplies  to  their  account  at  a  profit  to  him 
self  of  one  hundred  per  cent  or  more.  And  al 
though  he  was  party  to  the  contract,  he  was  sole 
keeper  of  all  records ;  and  it  was  not  necessary  to 
tell  the  consumer  what  he  was  being  charged  for 
a  gallon  of  molasses  till  the  final  settlement  next 
fall  or  Christmas, — and  not  necessary  then. 

This  system  was  the  successor  and  heir  of  the 
slave  system.  Elliot  lived  in  "the  Big  House"  on 
a  long  and  ample  hill  near  the  center  of  his  estates, 
while  the  Negroes  lived  in  cabins  of  one  or  two 
rooms,  all  over  the  great  plantations,  each  cabin 
being  situated  on  or  near  the  little  farm  that  was 
assigned  or  allotted  to  its  occupants.  Once  each 
month,  on  the  regular  "rationing  day,"  all  the 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  13 

heads  of  these  various  tenant  or  peon  families  came 
to  the  Big  House  to  claim  as  much  molasses,  salt 
pork,  meal,  dark-brown  sugar,  coffee  and  rice  as 
was  deemed  necessary  to  keep  their  respective 
families  alive  for  thirty  days  more.  This  system 
kept  them  tied  close  to  their  master  and  periodical 
ly  reminded  of  their  dependence  upon  him. 

The  landlord  was  perfectly  secure  in  these  ad 
vanced  outlays :  the  tenant  was  bound  by  this  debt 
and  local  law  would  enforce  it  against  his  very 
person,  spite  of  the  Thirteenth  Amendment.  If  he 
sought  to  escape,  any  justice  of  the  peace  could 
fine  'him  and  then  jail  him  in  default  of  payment 
of  fine.  But  of  course  the  fine  would  be  paid  by 
his  magnanimous  and  benevolent  (?)  landlord  and 
added  to  his  former  debt, — thus  binding  him  the 
closer.  In  fact  it  was  better  for  the  landlord  when  a 
peon  attempted  to  escape  and  failed,  for  after  the 
matter  was  reviewed  by  the  "court"  or  justice,  it 
gave  the  aggrieved  landlord  a  better  claim,  a  sort 
of  adjudicated  title  to  this  Negro's  brawn. 

Thus  the  original  "cost  of  transportation"  from 
South  Carolina  to  Arkansas  became  an  octopus 
with  ever  increasing  bulk  and  multiplying  suckers. 
Despair  broke  many  a  heart.  Even  the  doctor  and 
his  medicines  had  to  be  secured  through  this  sys 
tem.  Chills  and  fevers  attacked  the  unacclimated 
new-comers  arid  they  had  to  summon  the  planta 
tion  doctor,  who  got  his  pay,  not  from  the  tenant, 
but  from  the  great  land-baron,  who  in  turn  charged 


14  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

this  account  against  the  tenant's  account  at  the 
Big  House, — with  the  usual  profits.  This  doctor 
who  was  not  at  all  accountable  to  the  tenant, 
naturally  gave  himself  the  least  trouble:  he  might 
ride  to  the  door  of  a  cabin  where  black  people  lay 
fevered  and  delirious  within,  and  without  dismount 
ing  from  his  saddle  make  a  few  inquiries,  write  a 
prescription  for  medicine,  hand  it  down  and  ride 
away. 

Small  wonder  that  under  circumstances  such  as 
these  some  of  the  more  thrifty  and  determined 
immigrants  would  try  auxiliary  means  to  break 
the  bonds  of  this  gripping  debt-slavery, — even  al 
lowing  their  women  folk  to  serve  as  cooks  or  maids 
or  washerwomen  to  the  white  folk  in  the  Big  House 
and  elsewhere. 

And  this  is  how  "Aunt  Katy,"  now  a  woman 
of  middle  age,  had  come  into  the  family  of  John 
Elliot  as  a  maid-of-all-work.  Twenty  years  be 
fore,  when  she  was  a  slim  black  girl  of  twenty, 
she  and  her  father  and  mother  and'  younger 
sisters  and  brothers  had  become  the  debt-slaves  of 
John  Elliot.  They  were  of  those  wonderfully 
virile  black  folk  of  South  Carolina,  whose  mark 
can  be  found  everywhere  in  America  today.  They 
escaped  from  the  barren  poverty  of  their  native 
state  to  find  themselves  in  the  rich  cotton  lands 
of  the  great  Arkansas  "bottoms/"  but  also  in  the 
coils  of  the  octopus.  All  hands  worked  with  a  will, 
even  the  little  children  being  deprived  of  most  of 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  15 

their  schooling.  The  oldest  sister,  Katy,  was  hired 
out  as  house  girl  to  the  Elliots,  lords  of  the  estate. 
"Aunt  Katy,"  a  title  which  the  dignity  and  the 
burden  of  more  years  had  finally  won  for  her,  was 
now  a  matronly-looking  black  woman  with  a  bit 
of  gray  about  her  temples.  She  had  that  clear 
and  beautiful  black  skin  through  which  the  red 
blood  was  visible  on  the  more  prominent  features 
of  the  face. 

Aunt  Katy  had  a  daughter,  Essie,  who  should 
not  be  described  as  yellow,  but  as  of  a  rich  cream 
color  decorated  with  vanishing  rose  tints,  which 
sometimes  appear  in  the  sun-lit  eddies  when  the 
powerful  streams  of  black  and  white  run  into  the 
same  channel. 

And  Essie,  only  nineteen  years  old,  had  a  baby, 
with  dark  hair,  dark  eyes,  and  skin — white. 

Three  generations :  mother,  daughter,  grandson 
— black,  light,  white.  And  yet,  in  law,  they  were 
all  black ;  and  in  the  wisdom  of  the  same  law 
Essie,  Aunt  Katy's  daughter,  had  no  father,  and 
Essie's  baby  was  fatherless. 

And  yet  the  stranger,  to  whom  resemblances  are 
always  more  discernible,  might  have  noticed  that 
although  these  two  normal  human  creatures  were 
legally  akin  to  nobody,  they  very  much  resembled 
some  of  their  neighbors.  Essie  was  enough  like 
Mrs.  Elliot,  the  wife  of  the  landlord,  to  be  her 
daughter ;  and  Mrs.  Elliot's  baby  looked  like  the 
twin  of  Essie's  baby.  These  little  baby  boys  were 


16  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

six  months  old  and  just  ten  days  apart  in  their 
birth,  the  Elliot  baby  being  the  older.  And  they 
were  indeed  so  indistinguishably  alike  that  one 
day  Mrs.  Elliot,  seeing  Essie's  baby  clad  in  the 
cast-off  clothes  of  her  own  child,  seized  it  in  her 
arms,  and  pressing  it  to  her  heart  she  inquired  of 
Aunt  Katy  pettishly :  "Why  'have  you  put  my  little 
angel  into  these  old  rags?  I  told  you  to  throw 
them  away." 

"That's  Essie's— not  your'n!"  said  Aunt  Katy, 
in  a  tone  not  altogether  kind.  Mrs.  Elliot  almost 
dropped  the  child  into  Aunt  Katy's  arms.  Mrs. 
Elliot  had  heard  all  about  this  child  and  knew  well 
the  circumstances  of  its  being.  But  this  moment 
of  realization  seemed  to  arouse  the  jungle  woman. 
She  looked  wrathfully  toward  John  Elliot,  who 
sat  in  his  easy  chair,  spying  upon  the  scene  through 
the  smoke  screen  of  his  pipe.  He  was  the  picture 
of  self-satisfaction  and  conscious  mastery.  And 
when  his  angry  mate  turned  upon  him,  all  the 
threatening  storm  of  her  sex  gathered  itself  in 
this  one  harmless  bolt : 

"As  God  lives,  no  good  will  ever  come  of  this !" 
To  which  John  Elliot  replied  with  a  new  cloud  of 
smoke,  as  if  to  thicken  the  screen  and  dodge  any 
second  shot. 

Then,  as  too  frequently  happens  in  such  cases, 
this  indignant  wife  turned  all  her  anger  and  fury 
away  from  the  really  guilty  party  and  upon  his 
helpless  victims : 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  17 

"And  this  is  thanks,  is  it?  Katy?"  forgetting  the 
mollifying  Southern  term  of  "Aunt." — "We  gave 
you  work  and  bread  when  my  only  brother  was 
here, — and  there  is  Essie.  And  now  this  from  her, 
and  she  my  brother's  own  !" 

She  stopped  short  and  shook  with  wrath.  The 
code  of  honor  of  her  group  forbade  to  speak  plainly 
and  honorably  her  relationship  to  these  people.  But 
Essie  was  her  natural  niece,  her  own  brother's 
child ;  and  Essie's  baby  was  the  half-brother  and 
apparently  the  very  twin  of  her  own  child.  These 
plain  things  her  proud  tongue  could  not  utter,  but 
the  following  came  natural  to  her : 

"You  niggers  all !  Take  those  clothes  off  that 
brat,  and  never  bring  your  daughter  or  this  thing 
near  my  house  again.  Let  Essie  work  on  the  farm, 
and  we  have  plenty  of  coarse  cloth  for  nigger 
children." 

With  that  she  swept  proudly  away.  John  Elliot 
had  already  withdrawn  to  the  porch. 

Meanwhile  dark  rage  and  the  images  of  darker 
resolves  were  sweeping  the  dusky  breast  of  Aunt 
Katy,  like  the  shadows  of  storm  clouds.  She  re 
membered  how  twenty  years  ago  she  was  prac 
tically  trapped  and  assaulted  by  this  woman's  pam 
pered  brother,  and  how  this  very  woman  had  ex 
cused  and  connived,  and  was  certainly  an  accom 
plice  after  the  fact.  And  now  Essie,  the  fruit  and 
one  of  the  victims  of  the  previous  wrong,  had  told 
her  mother  how  this  white  woman's  own  husband 


18  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

had  at  first  attempted  to  take  advantage  of  her 
through  bribery  and  persuasion  and  coercion:  and 
failing  in  that,  had  finally  used  force  to  do  this 
thing. 

And  yet,  continued  Aunt  Katy's  memory,  this 
woman  had  kept  her  and  her  child  Essie  for  twenty 
years  in  the  Big  House.  A  few  weeks  before 
Essie's  baby  was  born,  Mrs.  Elliot  had  ordered 
Aunt  Katy  to  put  the  prospective  mother  into  one 
of  the  servant's  cabins ;  whereupon  Aunt  Katy  had 
also  moved  out  to  live  with  Essie  although  she 
still  performed  her  daily  tasks  at  the  Elliot's. 
The  baby  had  been  born,  and  everybody  had  re 
marked  that  it  was  "the  very  spit  an*  image  uv  ole 
man  Elliot."  The  colored  people  said  that  Essie's 
baby  and  Mrs.  Elliot's  baby  were  as  much  alike 
"as  two  black-eyed  peas." 

Time  had  passed,  and  Essie  began  again  to  go 
back  and  forth  from  the  cabin  to  the  Big  House 
to  assist  in  the  work.  Aunt  Katy  who  spent  most 
of  her  time  in  and  near  the  kitchen  and  dining 
room,  kept  the  little  grandchildren  with  her.  Un 
der  the  strange  power  which  the  evils  we  tolerate 
seem  to  acquire  over  us,  Mrs.  Elliot  had  apparent 
ly  become  reconciled  to  all  this,  and  Essie  was  as 
formerly  her  hair-dresser  and  maid.  But  the  mis 
tress  was  less  communicative,  somewhat  less  con 
descending  and  much  more  formal  in  her  rela 
tions  with  this  beautiful  outcaste  creature,  and 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  19 

always  dismissed  her  now  as  soon  as  the  work  was 
finished. 

In  a  few  moments  all  this  record  unrolled  itself 
in  Aunt  Katy's  heated  brain.  And  it  would  not 
have  comforted  the  Elliots,  had  they  remained  to 
observe  the  fire  of  her  dark  deep  African  eyes.  She 
hugged  passionately  the  little  nameless  grandchild, 
which,  though  frightened  for  the  moment  by  the 
storm  that  had  passed  with  Mrs.  Elliot,  was  still 
unconscious  of  its  own  situation  and  immune 
against  the  deeper  significance  of  all  these  clash 
ing  forces,  and  was  now  pressing  its  soft  baby 
cheek  against  the  dark  face  of  its  grandmother 
and  patting  her  neck  with  a  tiny  hand. 

"No!"  exclaimed  Aunt  Katy,  in  apostrophizing 
defiance,  "my  Essie  will  not  work  in  your  fields." 
Then  hugging  the  baby  closer:  "You  will  not  be 
put  among  strangers.  You  an*  Essie  can  stay  in 
the  cabin :  I  will  support  you."  And  looking-  in  the 
direction  toward  which  Mrs.  Elliot  had  gone : 
"What  can  she  do  without  me?  I  have  cared  for 
her  house  for  twenty  years. — Yes,  long  as  I  live, 
he  will  support  you,  and  Essie  too.  For  if  they 

refuse  to  support  you  in  the  cabin "  Her 

tongue  refused  to  utter  the  awful  thought  which 
seemed  to  find  it  difficult  to  express  itself  even  in 
the  sudden  demon  look  of  her  face.  This  terrible 
inspiration  ran  into  a  dry,  jerky,  inhuman  laugh, 
which  so  frightened  the  child  that  it  clung  the 
closer  about  her  neck.. 


CHAPTER  II. 

THE  TATTOO  AND  THE  SCAR 
THE  TATTOO 

Miss  Ollie  Price,  Mrs.  Elliot's  younger  sister, 
who  since  her  school-days  had  led  the  life  of  a 
social  "climber,"  and  almost  that  of  an  adven 
turess  in  the  east,  had  at  last  become  engaged  to 
some  French  sportsman,  and  was  now  back  at  her 
sister's  home  in  Arkansas  to  prepare  for  the  wed 
ding.  She  needed  a  maid,  she  must  have  a  maid. 
That  was  what  everybody  had  in  New  York  and 
Washington.  Mrs.  Elliot  told  her  that  on  all  the 
Elliot  plantations  there  was  but  one  person  quali 
fied  for  the  position, — Aunt  Katy's  daughter  Essie. 
Then  she  related  to  her  sister  all  the  circumstances 
connected  with  Essie's  banishment  to  the  cabin. 
Miss  Price  who  had  experienced  some  liberalizing 
contact  with  the  outside  world,  replied  that  it  was 
"too  bad,"  and  even  referred  to  Essie  as  "the  poor 
thing."  But  then  she  "must  have  a  suitable  maid." 

Essie  was  accordingly  recalled  from  her  exile 
to  serve  again  at  the  Big  House.  Expedience  is 


22  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

master  of  many  of  our  emotions  and  author  of 
many  of  our  decisions. 

Curiosity  led  "Miss  Ollie"  to  seek  an  oppor 
tunity  to  see  Essie's  baby.  One  day  while  Essie 
was  arranging  her  new  Mistress'  hair,  Miss  Price 
was  contemplating  the  face  and  figure  of  the 
beautiful  mulatto  in  her  mirror.  And  perhaps 
tenderness  was  vying  with  curiosity  when  she  said : 
"It  must  be  hard  to  leave  your  baby  so  long.  Bring 
him  with  you  tomorrow,  and  I  think — you  will 
work  better." 

"But,  Miss  Ollie,  Mis'  Elliot  ." 

"O,  that's  all  right,"  anticipated  Miss  Price,  "It'll 
be  all  right  in  my  rooms."  And  then  with  a  tone 
almost  of  command:  "Bring  him  tomorrow." 

The  next  day  Miss  Price  was  surprised  almost 
into  speechlessness  by  the  closeness  of  resemblance 
between  this  child  and  her  own  little  nephew.  She 
was  agitated.  By  a  strange  fascination  we  often 
seek  after  what  will  not  comfort  us.  "What  is  his 
name?"  she  asked  Essie,  as  the  little  fellow  traced 
with  his  finger  the  figures  in  the  wall  paper  op 
posite  her. 

"We  call  him  Jim,"  said  Essie,  blushing  and  un 
comfortable. 

"Jim!"  called  Miss  Price,  as  if  to  test  the  mat 
ter  or  to  destroy  a  possible  illusion.  The  little 
fellow  shrank  at  the  strange  voice,  turned  timidly 
and  moved  around  in  the  direction  of  its  mother. 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  23 

Her  own  nephew  would  run  to  her  at  the  slight 
est  invitation. 

The  sure  instincts  of  the  mother  caught  the 
meaning  of  all  this  curious  interest.  She  was  pen 
sive  and  pale  and  silent  as  she  worked  all  that 
morning,  and  little  Jim  also  gave  the  stranger  lady 
a  wide  berth  when  he  moved  about  the  room,  as  if 
sympathetic  with  his  mother's  spirit.  When  she 
went  away  at  noon  she  did  not  bring  him  back, 
and  she  remarked  that  he  was  right  out  in  the 
kitchen  with  "Aunt  Katy,"  as  she  called  her  own 
mother,  where  she  could  see  him  when  necessary. 
It  did  not  escape  her  notice  that  Miss  Price  now 
made  no  protest  against  his  absence,  and  never 
asked  to  see  him  and  never  even  mentioned  the 
child  again.  It  is  hard  to  be  consistent  in  a  false 
attitude. 

Miss  Price  talked  much  about  this  child,  how 
ever,  to  her  sister,  Mrs.  Elliot :  "Suppose  something 
should  happen!  How  could  you  make  sure?  Only 
their  clothes  make  it  possible  to  tell  one  from  the 
other." 

"Nonsense  !"  retorted  the  proud  white  mother, 
"because  you  have  been  staying  in  the  North,  you 
forget  the  difference  between  a  white  person  and 
a  nigger.  If  the  nails  or  the  hair  of  the  neck  don't 
tell,  the  very  spirit  will  tell.  Blood  will  tell !  Why, 
if  they  were  lost  till  they  were  grown,  you  could 
tell  the  white  man  and  the  nigger  when  you 
found  them." 


24  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

But  Miss  Price  was  nonetheless  skeptic.  She 
disclosed  to  her  sister  that  she  had  learned  from 
a  sailor  associate  in  the  east  the  art  of  tattooing, 
and  shocked  that  lady's  honor  and  offended  her 
pride  of  race  by  proposing  to  tattoo  little  nephew 
William  as  a  distinguishing  mark.  As  proof  of 
her  skill  she  showed  on  her  left  arm  a  small  tattoo 
which  she  herself  had  done.  The  haughty  wife 
and  proud  mother  rejected  this  proposal  with  an 
air  that  was  truly  impressive  of  her  faith  in  racial 
superiority  and  "blood." 

But  that  one  sight  of  little  Jim  had  stuck  like 
poison  in  Miss  Price's  soul.  She  could  be  seen 
often  brooding  and  gazing  into  the  far-away  when 
playing  with  nephew  William.  She  was  trying  to 
prevail  upon  her  sister  to  permit  her  to  take  the 
child  to  France  after  the  wedding.  Meanwhile  Mrs. 
Elliot  and  her  husband  were  summoned  to  the  bed 
side  of  her  brother,  the  natural  father  of  Essie,  who 
was  dying  in  Atlanta.  Miss  Price  readily  consent 
ed  to  assume  the  responsibility  for  the  household 
and  the  care  of  her  little  nephew.  The  Elliots  were 
gone  for  several  weeks,  what  with  funeral  arrange 
ments  and  what  with  looking  after  the  brother's 
estate. 

If  Mrs.  Elliot  had  ever  bathed  and  dressed  her 
own  baby  instead  of  leaving  it  entirely  to  the 
servants,  she  might  have  noticed,  when  she  re 
turned  from  Atlanta,  a  mark  under  its  arm  up 
near  the  body.  This  mark  was  irregular  in  shape 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  25 

but  might  have  passed  for  an  M  or  a  W,  accord 
ingly  as  one  looked  at  it.  But  with  her  sublime 
confidence  in  herself  and  her  kind,  she  noticed 
nothing.  And  the  servants,  who  had  been  glad  to 
have  "Miss  Ollte"  to  relieve  them  of  all  service  to 
little  "Willyum"  for  several  weeks,  saw  nothing — 
and  cared  not. 


THE  SCAR 

The  wedding  came  to  pass.  The  Elliots  were 
persuaded  to  take  the  trip  to  France  with  the  bride 
and  groom.  It  was  arranged  to  take  Essie  along 
as  maid  to  the  whole  party.  She  would  return 
with  the  Elliots,  who  would  stay  about  three 
months.  Mrs.  Elliot  had  consented  to  go  only  after 
her  sister  in  New  Orleans  agreed  to  come  and  be 
the  head  of  the  place  in  their  absence  and  take 
care  of  the  child.  Ancl  Essie  had  been  reconciled 
to  going  only  after  it  was  agreed  that  her  own 
mother,  Aunt  Katy,  should  have  entire  care  of 
"Jimmie."  The  Elliots  also  had  every  confidence 
in  Aunt  Katy,  but  then  it  "would  look  better  to 
have  some  white  person  in  charge  here."  That  is 
a  religion  in  the  South.  Aunt  Katy  would  be  the 
real  head  and  the  chief  reliance.  Indeed  nothing 
could  have  induced  Mrs.  Elliot  to  leave  her  child 
or  her  house  in  the  care  of  even  her  own  sister 
without  the  help  of  Aunt  Katy,  But  altho  a  col 
ored  person  may  be  the  defacto  head,  the  de  jure 
headship  must  reside  in  a  "white  person." 


26  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

This  New  Orleans  sister  could  not  come,  how 
ever,  until  some  time  after  the  wedding  party  had 
left,  and  before  the  Elliots  and  Duprees  set 
sail  from  New  York,  they  received  the  anxiously 
awaited  news  of  her  arrival.  She  reported  that 
all  was  well  at  the  Big  House  and  that  Aunt  Katy 
had  taken  excellent  care  of  the  interests  of  the 
Elliots.  She  had  met  the  new  arrival  and  brought 
little  William  in  her  arms,  who  was  "the  very 
picture  of  health,  and,  O,  so  fond  of  Aunt  Katy," 
as  the  letter  went  on  to  say. 

What  had  really  happened  was  this :  when  this 
strange  aunt  arrived,  the  child  in  Aunt  Katy's 
arms  would  have  nothing  to  do  with  the  new 
comer  but  clung  with  both  arms  tight  around  the 
black  woman's  neck,  its  cheek  against  her  cheek. 
The  child  seemed  frightened  when  the  stranger 
touched  it  and  showed  no  disposition  to  respond 
'to  her  repeated  invitations  to  "my  dearest  little 
nephew  William."  The  chagrined  aunt  did  not 
relate  all  this  in  her  letter,  for  indeed  she  felt 
ashamed  to  tell  in  detail  of  the  very  cold  recep 
tion  accorded  her  by  the  heir  to  the  Elliot  estate. 
Pride  deals  in  half  truths  and  camouflage.  She 
went  on  to  say  that  she  hoped  soon  to  win  the  en 
tire  confidence  and  affection  of  the  little  master 
of  the  place,  altho  they  were  strangers  for  the 
present  and  she  was  allowing  him  to  sleep  with 
Aunt  Katy. 

At   this   point    in   the   letter,    the   former   Miss 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  27 

Price  who  was  now  Madame  Dupree,  parted  her 
lips  and  gasped  ar»d  was  about  to  make  some  ear 
nest  comment, — but  subsided  when  the  next  line 
went  on  to  say : 

"Do  not  tell  Essie  that  a  little  accident  hap 
pened  to  Jimmie.  He  was  burned  the  next  day 
after  you  left.  He  was  not  seriously  hurt,  but 
the  doctor  says  it  will  leave  a  large  scar  on  his 
leg. 

"Aunt  Katy  says  it  happend  in  the  kitchen.  The 
child  pulled  a  hot  stove  lid  down.  Fortunately 
William  was  not  around,  as  Aunt  Katy  had  sent 
him  out  for  a  ride  with  the  new  nurse  who  came 
that  same  day." 

The  letter  repeated  and  emphasized  it  as  a  re 
quest  from  Aunt  Katy  "not  to  tell  Essie  about  it." 
and  said  that  the  grandmother  was  much  dis 
tressed.  This  last  statement  seemed  to  produce 
a  complete  calm  in  Madame  Dupree's  features, 
and  she  only  remarked:  "Aunt  Katy  always  would 
have  that  young  one  hanging  to  her  apron  in  the 
kitchen."  Then,  as  if  to  reassure  herself:  "And 
did  she  say  that  it  is  the  doctor's  opinion  that  the 
scar  on  the  leg  will  last  for  life?" 


CHAPTER  III. 

THE  DEMOCRACY  OF  BABYHOOD 

There  is  one  perfect  spirit  of  equality  in  this 
world, — in  babyhood.  Titles,  ancestors,  blood, 
wealth  and  social  circles  are  not  esteemed  by 
babies.  Feature  and  color  and  caste  do  not  vex 
the  social  life  of  babydom. 

Little  William  and  little  Jimmie  were  in  their 
second  year  of  life.  With  their  parents  far  over 
the  sea,  and  with  their  guardians,  Aunt  K-aty  and 
"Auntie,"  equally  as  far  way,  so  far  as  the  babies 
were  concerned,  being-  in  distant  parts  of  the  Big 
House, — 'the  two  little  fellows  were  enjoying  each 
other's  society  in  the  great  dining  room,  without 
reserve.  Jimmie  was  dressed  in  home-made  ging 
hams  and  his  feet  were  bare.  An  ugly  scar  of  the 
recent  burn  could  be  seen  on  his  otherwise  perfect 
baby  leg.  William  was  dressed  in  blue  serge,  trim 
med  in  white,  with  blue-and-white  socks  and  black 
pumps. 

William  selected  the  rag  doll,  which  Aunt  Katy 
had  made  for  Jimmie,  seated  it  in  the  best  chair 
of  his  doll  furniture  set,  ;  and  was  feeding 
"M'randa"  some  "soogar"  out  of  a  silver  spoon. 


30  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

Jimmie  in  the  meanwhile  had  the  blue-eyed,  linen- 
clad,  frilled-up  French  doll  which  Aunt  Ollie  had 
given  William,  and  was  trying  to  compel  this  well- 
dressed  foreigner  to  do  the  menial  work  of  shovel 
ing  the  dirt  from  the  dust  pan  into  a  teacup.  A 
large  pot  spoon  longer  than  the  doll  was  the  "shub- 
ble."  And  as  the  frilled-up  Frenchman  seemed  not 
to  take  hold  enthusiastically  and  to  be  unapprecia- 
tive  of  the  dignity  of  labor,  Jimmie  was  occasional 
ly  pulling  its  blond  hair  and  slapping  its  face  until 
its  blue  eyes  shook,  while  he  lectured  in  the  best 
baby  Brobdingnagian  style. 

After  William's  rag  doll  protege  had  indeed 
much  more  sugar  on  the  outside  than  on  the  in 
side, — as  much  of  that  article  was  sticking  in 
grains  about  its  mouth  and  piled  in  heaps  in  its 
lap  and  on  the  floor,  in  the  manner  of  real  babies, 
— William  remembered  to  hang  a  napkin  about 
its  dingy  neck.  He  was  much  kinder  to  this  rag 
baby  than  was  Jimmie  to  the  fashionable  French 
man.  Adjusting  the  napkin,  he  next  placed  on 
"M'randa's"  lap  a  table  spoon  and  an  individual  but 
ter  dish  running  over  with  "soogar."  Completing 
this  pacifying  arrangement,  he  rose  to  his  feet, 
grabbed  the  coarse  bonnet  which  belonged  to  Jim 
mie,  and  placed  it  on  his  own  head.  He  then  turn 
ed  toward  his  playmate,  who  was  still  busily  em 
ploying  extreme  but  ineffectual  measures  to  in 
dustrialize  the  aristocratic  Frenchman,  and  beat 
ing  the  air  with  his  hands,  he  uttered,  in  sharp 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  31 

accents  which  sounded  like  a  series  of  commands, 
the  following  vocals : 

"Ah  !  ah  !  oo — oo — oo — oo  !  ee — eeh !" 

Whatever  all  that  may  mean  in  the  secret  codes 
of  babyhood,  Jimmie  understood  it  instantly  and 
perfectly.  He  looked  up,  and  jumped  from  his 
corner,  dropping  the  indocile  Frenchman  into  the 
dirt  of  the  dust  pan.  Then  he  ran  and  picked  up 
the  cream-colored,  blue-ribboned  sailor  hat  which 
belonged  to  William,  and  put  it  on  his  own  head. 
Hand-in-hand  they  now  turned  toward  the  door 
and  were  just  about  to  sally  forth  to  some  great 
baby  adventure,  when  in  came  William's  New  Or 
leans  Aunt  facing  them  like  an  angry  fairy: 

"William !" and  then  she  stopped,  turned  to 

stone,  as  it  were,  by  the  sight  which  she  beheld; 
two  little  playmates  in  perfect  accord  and  brother 
hood,  with  not  a  thought  of  difference  or  caste; 
William  with  his  linens  under  Jimmie's  coarse  bon 
net  and  Jimmie  with  his  ginghams  under  William's 
trim  sailor. 

The  next  reaction  of  the  sophisticated  grown-up 
was  violent.  She  flung  the  bonnet  from  William's 
head  and  jerked  the  sailor  from  the  head  of  Jim 
mie.  And  again  she  was  turned  to  stone  when 
those  two  heads  were  disclosed :  they  were  so  much 
alike,  evidently  from  the  same  mold.  She  looked 
at  the  scar  on  Jimmie's  leg  and  muttered  some 
thing  about  "providence."  What  conceit  it  is  that 
makes  us  believe  that  supernatural  powers  are 


32  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

allied  with  our  littlenesses.  Both  children  recoiled 
before  her  scrutiny.  Her  own  nephew  still  pre 
ferred  Aunt  Katy  at  times,  which  somewhat 
annoyed  his  aunt.  The  likeness  of  these  two  babies 
had  never  before  impressed  her  so  deeply.  In  her 
curiosity  she  took  hold  of  Jimmie,  turned  him  round 
and  round,  looked  alternately  from  him  to  William, 
and  examined  the  scar  again.  She  pushed  up  the 
wide  gingham  sleeves  of  the  puzzled  little  fellow, 
looking  ever  and  anon  toward  William.  And  fin 
ally,  fixing  her  eyes  for  a  moment  on  something 
under  Jimmie's  arm,  she  muttered :  "A  birthmark 
also." 

Then  leading  little  William  with  one  hand  and 
carrying  his  defiled  sailor  hat  in  the  other,  she 
went  out  of  the  dining  room  toward  the  parlors, 
leaving  Jimmie  as  if  he  were  no  longer  in  exis 
tence.  The  latter  instinctively  resented  this  slight 
by  kicking  over  the  rag  doll  and  spilling  her  plate 
of  sugar,  after  which  he  pulled  the  napkin  from 
her  neck  and  stood  holding  her  by  one  leg  as  if 
contemplating  some  much  more  terrible  reprisals. 

The  New  Orleans  Aunt  had  not  been  conscious 
of  the  dark  face  that  had  watched  her  actions  from 
the  time  when  she  came  upon  these  two  Utopians 
until  she  spoiled  their  dreams  and  left  Jimmie  alone 
and  full  of  the  will  to  sabotage.  But  thru  the 
opposite  door  which  opened  upon  the  old-fashioned 
passage  way  leading  to  the  kitchen,  two  eyes  had 
gazed  upon  her, — eyes  of  white  and  black  and 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Geds  33 

fire.  So  Jimmie  stood,  holding  his  rag  doll  peril 
ously  by  the  leg  and  trying  to  solve  the  mystery 
of  the  sudden  and  terrible  power  which  had  inter 
rupted  the  normal  course  of  his  life  and  carried 
off  his  playmate,  when  Aunt  Katy  entered,  chuckled, 
took  him  into  her  arms,  and  with  rather  more 
affection  than  she  had  lately  bestowed  upon  him, 
she  hugged  him  to  her  bosom  and  carried  him  off 
to  the  kitchen. 


CHAPTER  IV. 

THE  POWER  OF  CIRCUMSTANCE 

No ;  environment  is  not  omnipotent,  but  it  is  so 
almost  all-powerful  that  it  deserves  the  major  con 
sideration  in  the  making  of  a  man  on  earth.  Here 
are  two  babies.  Three-fourths  of  the  blood  of  the 
one  is  from  the  same  sources  as  three-fourths  of 
the  blood  of  the  other.  And  that  other  fourth  of 
blood  is  just — human  blood.  In  physical  feature 
they  are  like  duplicates.  But  the  divergence  of 
their  ways  on  earth  will  carry  them  to  differing 
destinies. 

And  which  is  which?  Why  did  Aunt  Katy  hug 
little  William  so  passionately  when  alone  with 
him  ?  And  when  alone  with  little  Jimmie,  why  did 
she  croon  so  wierdly  and  almost  compassionately 
over  him,  and  treat  him  with  all  the  indulgent  pity 
of  her  race?  William's  aunt  remarked  the  strange 
fascination  with  which  Jimmie  seemed  to  hold  his 
grandmother. 

And  why  had  Aunt  Katy  done  this  thing  which 
"Miss  Ollie"  feared  would  be  done,  and  which  the 
reader  of  this  history  must  by  this  time  suspect  to 


36  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

have  been  done?  Partly  for  fear  and  partly  for 
revenge. 

For  fear:  because  she  had  often  heard  John  El 
liot  tell,  with  approval,  of  the  terrible  vengeance 
wreaked  by  one  of  his  brothers  on  "a  little  nigger 
gal."  It  seemed  that  the  little  colored  girl  was 
not  much  older  than  his  brother's  child  whom  she 
was  supposed  to  nurse  and  take  care  of;  and  that 
by  carelessness  or  childish  neglect  she  had  allowed 
the  little  white  child  to  come  too  near  a  boiling 
pot  in  which  soap  was  being  made.  The  child 
stumbled,  overturned  the  pot  and  scalded  itself  to 
death.  The  angry  and  brutal  father  then  seized 
the  little  nurse  and  "cut  both  ears  off  that  little 
nigger."  All  the  other  colored  people  had  fled  at 
the  sight,  so  that  "nobody  ever  knew  what  became 
of  the  rest  of  the  little  nigger  gal,"  for  not  even 
the  parents  of  the  colored  child  had  dared  to  ad 
dress  any  inquiries  to  the  infuriated  demon  who 
was  responsible  for  her  unrevealed  fate.  Aunt 
Katy  recalled  this  oft  repeated  story  and  remem 
bered  that  ias  John  Elliot  was  leaving  on  the  previ 
ous  day,  he  had  said  to  her  concerning  William: 
"Take  good  care  of  him, — for  hell  will  be  too  good 
for  any  nigger  if  he  gets  hurt."  And  so,  as  the 
stove  lid  fell  on  that  little  leg,  what  was  Aunt  Katy 
to  do  when  there  was  another  pair  of  little  legs 
just  like  them,  close  at  hand  and  perfectly  sound? 

For  revenge :  because  in  the  innermost  of  her 
soul  she  had  always  resented  with  deepest  human 


The  Veng-eance  of  the  Gods  37 

hate  the  outrage  which  John  Elliot  had  committed 
upon  the  innocence  of  her  little  Essie.  Every  slight 
and  every  act  of  neglect  or  contempt  which  Essie 
and  Essie's  child  had  suffered  from  the  Elliots 
and  their  kin,  had  deepened  this  hate  and  fed  this 
desire  for  revenge.  Whenever  John  Elliot  was  the 
offender,  the  inspiration  to  this  deed  had  spoken  in 
her  ear  like  a  tempting  devil. 

So — well — when  the  Elliots  returned  from  Eu 
rope,  William  had  become  quite  fond  of  his  New 
Orleans  aunt,  but  looked  strangely  upon  his  pa 
rents,  which  was  "perfectly  natural."  He  had  to 
be  won  over  by  his  mother  and  father,  but  that  was 
soon  done  with  a  multitude  of  playthings  and 
goodies. 

What  did  the  babies  care? 

****** 

We  next  see  these  two  children  when  they  are 
seven  years  old.  How  swift  is  the  passage  of 
childhood, — to  the  eye  of  the  observer.  But  to  the 
child  it  seems  longer,  the  longest  period  of  life, — 
like  great  oceans  of  time. 

In  outward  appearances  these  two  little  boys  had 
become  less  alike,  so  that  now  there  was  no  mis 
taking  the  one  for  the  other.  But  if  one  disre 
garded  the  illusions  and  veneer  of  this  world's  for 
tunes  and  saw  only  their  essential  features,  they 
were  still  enough  alike  to  be  twins.  Clothing  and 
the  care  of  their  bodies  clearly  distinguished  them. 
Besides,  each  had  now  a  personality  which  could 


38  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

never  be  confcmnded  with  the  other.  William  was 
generally  well-dressed,  well-shod,  pampered  and 
autocratic.  Essie's  "little  nigger  Jim"  was  clad  in 
home-made  things  or  cast-offs,  and  had  a  temper 
to  fight  and  a  disposition  to  carry  away  the  play 
things  of  the  little  autocrat.  The  last  named  trait 
was  "proof  of  his  sect,"  as  the  colloquialism  used 
by  Mrs.  Elliot  would  have  it.  She  often  pointed 
to  the  differences  between  these  two  little  spirits, 
especially  in  the  presence  of  John  Elliot,  in  sup 
port  of  her  theories  about  "blood," — as  if  indeed 
that  was  the  only  difference, — as  if  they  were  other 
wise  circumstanced  alike, — when  as  a  matter  of 
fact  they  were  more  nearly  equally  endowed  with 
"blood"  than  with  any  other  thing. 

But  while  William  was  an  autocrat,  Jimmie  was 
a  revolutionist,  a  radical.  Ever  and  anon  was  the 
autocrat  forced  to  call  loudly  for  aid  from  the 
greater  powers  against  this  unsubduable  revolu 
tionist.  Aunt  Katy,  Essie  and  others  of  the  serv 
ants  had  often  to  succor  the  titled  possessor  of 
the  throne.  Some  of  these  encounters  were  nat 
urally  provoked  by  the  arrogance  of  the  little 
autocrat,  who  was  beginning  to  overhear  the  con 
versations  of  his  elders,  and  to  understand  that 
between  him  and  Jimmie  there  was  some  sort  of 
a  gulf  fixed, — a  gulf  which  he  himself  might  cross 
and  recross  at  will,  but  which  forever  shut  Jimmie 
out. 

The    Russo-Japanese    war    was     going    on,    and 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  39 

when  a  great  naval  battle  was  imminent,  John  El 
liot  had  remarked  to  guests  at  .table  that  the  Jap 
anese  could  never  win  because  they  were  "too  much 
like  niggers."  This  unpremised  conclusion  about 
"niggers"  went  unchallenged,  as  usual.  William 
•had  listened  closely  to  this  table-talk.  And  so  in 
the  afternoon,  when  he  carried  his  bean-shooting 
cannon  and  his  uniformed  card-board  soldiers  into 
the  kitchen  yard  to  play  war  with  Jimmie,  he 
Insisted  that  his  side  must  be  the  "Rushins"  and 
and  that  Jimmie's  side  must  be  the  "nigger  Japs." 
This  was  finally  agreed  to  by  Jimmie,"as  nationali 
ties  were  not  so  important  to  him.  For  Jimmie's 
army  consisted  of  soldiers  of  different  sizes  and 
shapes  and  colors,  which  with  the  help  of  Aunt 
Katy  he  had  recruited  with  a  pair  of  scissors  from 
old  paper  boxes,  and  a  few  faded,  battered  and 
crippled,  limbless  or  headless  "Rushins"  which  the 
opposing  general  magnanimously  loaned  him  on 
the  eve  of  battle.  And  while  Jimmie  was  setting 
his  motley  army  'in  battle  array,  it  seems  that  the 
"Rushin"  general  had  the  nerve  to  fire  a  shot  at 
them  before  the  "nigger  Jap"  general  "wuz  ready 
to  give  orders  to  shoot."  In  the  heated  parley 
which  followed  from  these  oddly  conflicting  no 
tions  of  the  laws  of  war,  the  commanders  came  to 
blows.  And  when  John  Elliot  rushed  from  the 
house  with  reinforcement  for  the  distressed  and 
vociferous  "Rushin,"  the  opposing  general  had  dis 
carded  the  conventional  weapons  of  warfare,  and 


40  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 


his  left  fingers  in  the  curls  of  his  antag 
onist,  was  pounding  him  with  his  right  fist  and 
with  the  rer^ilarity  of  drumfire.  At  sight  of  this 
savage  attax.**,  John  Elliot,  one  of  the  great  pow 
ers,  rushed  forward,  seized  the  barbarian  in  the 
back,  gave  him  two  hard  spanks,  then  dropped  him 
and  turned  to  console  the  rescued  party.  But  in 
stead  of  yielding  tamely,  the  little  Afro-Asiatic, 
catching  the  great  power  for  a  moment  off  guard, 
kicked  him  violently  on  the  shin  and  retreated^at 
top  speed.  Whereupon  that  infuriated  superman, 
tho  more  insulted  than  injured,  uttered  this  fear 
ful  prophecy  :  "The  little  devil  !  that  nigger  will 
die  with  his  boots  on." 

Jimmie  was  now  completely  outlawed  ;  all  dip 
lomatic  and  commercial  intercourse  was  forbidden, 
and  never  again  was  he  to  be  tolerated  on  the 
premises  of  the  Big  House,  the  stronghold  of  the 
powerful  land-baron,  John  Elliot. 


CHAPTER  V. 

THE  TWO  SCHOOLS 

It  is  unnecessary  to  write  the  full  story  of  the 
education  and  development  of  these  two  human 
beings.  It  would  be  but  a  history  for  which  any 
one  who  knows  the  conditions,  might  adduce  a 
hundred  parallels. 

The  little  outlaw,  Jimmie,  was  never  again  al 
lowed  on  the  Elliot  premises.  But  whenever  Jo'hn 
Elliot  saw  Aunt  Katy  alone,  he  always  inquired 
Interestedly  after  "that  little  rascal."  Elliot  sel 
dom  saw  Essie :  with  the  intense  partizanship  and 
the  sensitiveness  of  a  mother,  she  had  resented 
the  exclusion  of  Jimmie  and  gradually  grown  away 
from  personal  service  to  the  Elliots.  She  sought 
other  work,  washing,  ironing  and  sewing  at  home. 
Meanwhile  she  married,  unfortunately,  one  of  the 
male  minions  of  Elliot's  household,— a  tale-bearing 
Negro,  one  of  those  seemingly  unnatural  but 
ubiquitous  products  which  spring  up  whenever  one 
race  presses  another  race  down.  This  miserable 
wretch  was  continually  filling  Elliot's  ear  with  evil 
reports,,  as  to  how:  "Essie's  spoilin'  dat  boy  o' 


42  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

her'n,  I'se  tried  to  be  a  step-daddy  to  him  an* 
make  some'n  out  o'  him.  But  Essie  teaches  him 
to  feel  he  jes'  ez  good  ez  any  white  boy,  an*  I 
know  ain't  no  good  cotnin'  uv  a  nigger  whut  grow- 
up  thinkin'-  he  good  ez  white  fokes."  Not  only 
was  Jimmie  thrust  further  and  further  away 
from  the  possibility  of  any  favor  at  the  Big  House, 
but  once  Essie  had  to  conceal  the  child  for  nearly 
all  winter  to  save  him  from  the  terrible  wrath  of 
John  Elliot,  after  Jimmie  had  thrashed  Master  Wil 
liam  on  the  way  home  from  their  separate  schools, 
when  their  paths  and  their  boyish  wills  happened 
to  cross. 

These  two  children  attended  schools  that  were 
not  only  separate  but  very  different.  William  had 
less  than  forty  schoolmates,  but  two  teachers,  a 
man  and  a  woman,  both  college-trained  people. 
Jimmie  had  more  than  a  hundred  schoolmates,  but 
one  teacher, — a.  man,  who  had  probably  gone  to 
school  at  sometime  somewhere,  but  whose  chief 
qualification  consisted  of  the  fact  that  for  years 
he  had  helped  John  Elliot  to  recruit  new  "hands" 
for  the  farm  by  inducing  his  illiterate  and  unwary 
fellow-blacks  in  the  Carolinas  and  Georgia  to 
"come  west  and  make  a  fortune."  William's 
school  opened  in  September  and  kept  till  May. 
Jimmie's  school  was  open  for  six  or  eight  weeks  in 
the  latter  part  of  summer,  after  the  crops  were 
"laid  by,"  and  again  for  six  or  eight  weeks  in  the 
dead  of  winter,  between  the  end  of  the  cotton- 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  43 

picking  season  and  the  beginning  of  "breakin' 
ground"  for  spring  planting.  William  sat  in  a 
schoolhouse  that  was  fairly  modern.  Jimmie  was 
taught  in  a  colored  church  building,  with  scant 
light  and  board-shutter  windows,  which  was  rented 
by  the  schoolboard  for  one  dollar  a  week. 
*  *  *  *  *  * 

A  few  years  later  William  graduated  from  the 
high  school  in  Little  Rock,  to  which  he  had  been 
sent  after  finishing  the  work  of  the  local  school. 
Jimmie,  now  grown  to  "Jim,"  had  been  taken  out 
of  school  when  he  was  in  the  "third  reader,"  to 
help  his  unfortunate  mother  and  his  shiftless  step 
father  to  earn  a  living.  The  stepfather  and  John 
Elliot  had  agreed  together  that  too  much  learning 
would  spoil  any  "biggity  yaller  nigger." 

These  two  boys,  now  eighteen  years  old,  still  re 
sembled  each  other,  but  not  as  closely  as  when  they 
were  infants.  Beings  of  the  same  genus  or  species 
are  more  alike  in  the  earlier  stages  of  their  de 
velopment.  Up  to  a  certain  period  in  their  growth 
the  foetus  of  the  human  is  even  indistinguishable 
from  that  of  the  ape.  Long  since  had  the  face  of 
Jim  ceased  to  be  confounded  in  the  mind  of  people 
with  the  face  of  William.  But  the  colored  people 
contended  that  Jim  was  much  more  "like  the  spit 
o*  ole  Man  Elliot."  Jim  was  angular  and  sun 
burned.  William  was  rounded  in  feature  and  rather 
brunette.,  and  the  proud  Mrs.  Elliot  said  that  he 


44  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

bore  the  lines  and  complexion  of  her  family,  the 
Prices,  rather  than  those  of  the  Elliots. 

And  now  these  two  boys  were  about  to  enter 
the  two  most  important  schools  of  their  divergent 
careers :  William  was  to  enter  the  State  Univer 
sity,  Jim  was  to  enter  the  State  Penitentiary. 

"Father,  what  has  been  done  about  the  case  of 
that  nigger  Jim?"  inquired  William,  as  he  took 
his  last  breakfast  at  home  before  leaving  to  catch 
the  train. 

"Saved  him  from  gettin'  lynched — sendin*  him 
to  pen'  for  four  years — guess  they'll  teach  him 
somethin'  there" — was  the  laconic  reply. 

"But,  father,  those  boys  told  me  that  five  of 
them  had  Jim  down,  beating  him,  and  that  he 
snatched  a  stick  from  one  of  them  and  knocked 
the  Brough  boy's  eye  out  while  lying  on  his  back 
trying  to  beat  the  white  boys  off." 

"Six  niggers  to  one  white  man  in  this  county," 
commented  the  senior  Elliot, — "never  do  to  let 
one  of  'em  get  away  with  a  thing  like  that.  But 

if  he  hadn't  been  such  a  biggity  nigger  "  and 

Elliot  looked  far  away  as  if  dreaming,  or  remem 
bering.     "Never  wanted  to  be  treated  like  other 
niggers,  always  in  a  fight.     Essie's  husband,  Sam, 
testified  that  Jim  always  led  the  nigger  boys  in 
fights  against  white  boys." 

"I  saw  Essie  yesterday,  with  her  ten-year  old 
girl,  Mary,"  said  William,  as  his  eyes  moistened. 
"They  were  very  wretched;  they  certainly  love 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  45 

Jim.  Somehow  I  felt  very  bad  when  I  looked  at 
them." 

"At  which  one?"  asked  Elliot,  as  he  bit  savage 
ly  into  his  food.  But  just  then  his  wife  gave  him 
a  look  which  ended  his  remark. 

"Both  of  them,"  said  William,  honestly,  "but 
especially  Essie.  Her  flushed  face  and  pleading, 
suffering  eyes  made  orie  feel  sad." 

John  Elliot  looked  furtively  at  William,  as  he 
thought  of  Essie's  beautiful  little  Mary.  For  the 
first  time  he  felt  a  deep  sense  of  guilt  and  ac 
countability.  For  it  matters  not  what  we  are, 
we  always  want  our  children  to  be  the  noblest. 

After  a  few  minutes  o>f  silence,  William  unwit 
tingly  showed  where  his  unuttered  thoughts  had 
been,  by  continuing  them  aloud:  "And  they  say 
that  Jim's  fight  was  about  his  little  sister  Mary. 
The  B rough  boy  and  his  gang  had  shouted  insults 
at  her  as  she  was  going  to  school  and  ." 

"Well,  my  boy,"  interrupted  Elliot,  "you  must 
be  leaving  to  catch  your  train  in  two  hours.  Make 
sure  that  you  have  all  your  things  packed.  We 
expect  you  to  make  good  in  college.  All  we  have 
is  yours,  as  soon  as  you  are  ready  to  take  charge 
of  it.  Your  mother  and  I  are  gettin'  old,  you 
know." 

"Speaking  of  Essie's  eyes,"  put  in  Mrs.  Elliot, 
who  seemed  to  be  unaware  of  Elliot's  effort  to 
change  the  subject  of  thought, — "speaking  of  eyes 
reminds  me  of  the  look  which  Jim  gave  me  as 


46  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

the  sheriff  was  leading  him  away  after  his  sen 
tence.  He  frightened  me,  and  it  frightens  me 
every  time  I  remember  that  look.  I  had  really 
never  looked  into  his  face  since  long  ago,  when 
as  a  little  boy  he  used  to  play  around  the  house 
here  with  you," — and  she  directed  her  eyes  at 
William.  And  then,  with  that  suddenness  with 
which  some  women  can  change  from  timid  bird  to 
fierce  feline,  she  looked  reproachfully  at  John  El 
liot  and  continued:  "But  I  just  feel  that  no  good 
will  ever  come  of  the  existence  of  that  nigger, — 
for  nigger  blood  will  tell." 

The  embarrassment  Avas  relieved  by  a  confusion 
and  rushing  of  feet  from  the  direction  of  the  kitch 
en,  and  above  it  all  the  voice  of  Aunt  Katy :  "My 
po'  chile,  my  po'  li'l  chile !  You  must  not  suffer 
so, — you  shall  not  suffer  so!"  and  Essie  burst  into 
the  Elliot  dining  room,  her  hair  disheveled,  her 
face  blotched  with  much  weeping,  and  her  left 
arm  around  the  beautiful  neck  of  little  Mary,  who 
clung  to  her  mother  and  wept  sympathetically. 
Mary  was  of  a  shade  between  brown  and  yellow 
and  had  very  black  and  slightly  wavy  hair.  And 
as  she  stood  clinging  to  the  waist  of  the  mater 
dolorosa,  the  eye  of  the  aritist  might  have  seen 
framed  in  that  doorway  a  truer  picture  of  inno 
cence  and  beauty  and  of  love  and  sorrow  than  in 
a.  thousand  madonnas. 

Essie,  her  eyes  suddenly  flashing  out  of  their 
watery  depths  and  blazing  like  pools  of  fire,  spoke 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  47 

with  the  effrontery  and  the  unnatural  temerity  of 
madness  :  "John  Eliot !  John  Eliot !  My  Jimmie, — 
he  was  just  trying  to  save  his  little  sister!  You 
know  what !  God !  You  know  what !" 

Elliot  bounded  forward  angrily,  as  if  to  shut  off 
something  which  he  feared  was  coming,  but  his 
right  arm  was  seized  by  William,  who  said  pas 
sionately:  "Father!  the  poor  thing  is  just  crazy 
about  her  boy, — that  is  all.  Let  her  go.  Take 
her  away,  Aunt  Katy." 

Something  seemed  to  stir  in  Mrs.  Elliot,  and  for 
the  first  time  in  nearly  twenty  years  she  felt  to 
wards  Essie  as  a  real  human  and  almost  as  a  sister. 
She  put  her  arms  tremblingly  about  the  sad,  mad 
mother  and  said :  "Poor  girl,  somehow  I  feel  a  great 
pity  for  Jim,  too.  Let  us  bear  it,  and  perhaps  all 
will  be  well." 

The  actions  and  sentimentality  of  his  wife  and 
his  son  had  disarmed  and  almost  unnerved  John 
Elliot,  and  he  strode  impatiently  and  disgustedly 
out  of  the  opposite  door. 

"Come,  my  po'  HT  chile,"  said  Aunt  Katy,  gray- 
haired  now,  but  erect,  and  with  the  same  burning 
eyes, — "come,  my  baby,"  as  she  pulled  along  Essie, 
now  unresisting, — "come  home  with  yo'  mammy 
an'  she  will  console  you,"  and  shouting  defiantly  in 
the  direction  of  the  door  out  of  which  John  Elliot 
had  gone, — "Yes,  I  can  console  her!"  And  then  the 
dry  mirthless  laugh  of  hysteria  or  secret  ven 
geance,  as. she  led  her  child  and  grandchild  away. 


48  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

Mrs.  Elliot  and  William  stood  for  a  few  mo 
ments  unconscious  of  each  other,  and  then  she,  as 
if  waking  from  a  dream,  said :  "Come,  my  boy,  you 
must  get  ready  for  your  train."  And  he,  as  if 

aroused  from  a  trance :  "O —  er —  yes,  mother." 
****** 

When  Mrs.  Elliot  was  returning  from  seeing 
William  off,  she  stopped  her  car  when  Essie  hailed 
•her  by  the  side  of  the  road:  "Mis'  Elliot,  I  hope  I 
didn't  hurt  your  feelin's,"  and  she  looked  with  such 
deep  and  genuine  compassion  upon  the  white  moth 
er  that  the  latter  was  puzzled.  ''But  we  dearly 
love  Jim,"  continued  Essie,  "an'  we  will  always 
love  him." 

The  somewhat  mystified  Mrs.  Elliot  ascribed  this 
to  madness  and  replied  sympathetically,  "And  I 
will  always  pity  him." 

"An'— Mis'  Elliot,— where  is  he  gone?" 

"Who?" 

"My — er — Master  William,"  said  Essie,  holding 
her  breath. 

"He  has  gone  off  to  college  for  four  years.  The 
poor  boy  felt  very  sorry  for  you,  Essie, — and  for 
Jim." 

And  Mrs.  Elliot  drove  on  to  the  Big  House. 


CHAPTER  VI. 

THE  TWO  GRADUATES 

William  had  spent  his  four  years  in  college,  and 
Jim  his  four  in  prison.  John  Elliot  had  told  Aunt 
Katy  that  William  was  not  to  return  to  the  plan 
tation  but  would  go  direct  from  college  to  France, 
where  he  would  live  with  his  aunt,  Madame  Du- 
pree,  and  study  for  a  year  or  two.  But  Jim  was 
coming  home,  and  Aunt  Katy  and  Essie,  and  Mary 
who  was  now  nearly  fifteen  years  old,  were  pre 
paring  to  receive  him.  In  spite  of  what  Aunt 
Katy  had  told  her,  Essie  still  loved  Jim, — and  Aunt 
Katy  loved  him  too.  He  was  a  part  of  their  lives. 
Had  he  not  been  their  boy  from  babyhood?  And 
with  all  his  waywardness,  he  had  been  affectionate 
and  obedient  to  Aunt  Katy  and  Essie,  and  to  the 
beautiful  little  Mary  he  was  big  brother,  worship 
ful  knight  and  hero.  Nearly  all  his  fights  and  quar 
rels  had  been  in  defense  of  her.  In  the  four  years 
of  his  absence  she  had  greatly  idealized  this  de 
voted  brother,  for  she  did  not  share  the  secret  of 
the  older  women.  Essie  loved  Jim  maternally,  but 
she  did  not  doubt  the  truth  of  the  confession  and 


50  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

disclosure  of  Aunt  Katy.  And  she  remembered 
that  while  they  were  in  France  and  before  they 
left  New  York  letters  had  come  from  the  New 
Orleans  Aunt  reciting  how  little  "William"  would 
have  nothing  to  do  with  her  at  first,  and  saying 
that  she  had  to  gradually  win  him  from  the  apron 
strings  of  Aunt  Katy  in  the  kitchen.  And  the 
thing  was  plain  on  its  face, — when  once  you  knew 
'it :  for  there  was  Jim,  angular,  pale,  and  tan, 
phlegmatic  and  vindictive ;  while  William  was  in 
feature  rounded  and  in  color  brunette,  and  sym 
pathetic  in  disposition.  But  in  spite  of  all,  they 
loved  Jim,  and  were  "killing  the  fattest  calf,"  as 
Aunt  Katy  expressed  it,  for  his  return. 

There  is  no  other  mother  heart  on  earth  like 
that  which  beats  with  African  blood.  It  can  love 
the  children  of  other  mothers,  even  -those  of  the 
oppressor,  almost  as  dearly  as  it  loves  its  own. 
The  Negro  mother  is,  not  in  mere  fiction,  but  in 
very  fact  of  flesh  and  blood  and  affection,  the 
greatest  mother  in  the  zvorld. 

Jim  met  a  royal  welcome  from  these  three. 
Little  Mary's  father,  Sam,  was  less  cordial ;  he  had 
never  liked  Jim.  When  Jim  was  arrested  for  fight 
ing  on  account  of  Mary  and  for  defending  himself, 
it  was  this  tale-bearing  step-father  who  had 
sneaked  around  to  the  Big  House :  "Ah  declare,  Mr. 
Ellyut,  Ah  allus  wanted  to  do  my  dooty  by  Jim,  but 
he  been  de  mos'  onmannerrest  boy.  Ah  try  to 
teach  him  dat  if  he  is  a  bright  merlatter,  he  jes* 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  51 

lak  other  niggers.  But  he  ain't  got  no  regards  fer 
me,  an'  Ah  allus  feared  his  hate  'g'inst  white  fokes 
gwine  git  him  in  trouble."  And  in  court  he  had 
testified :  "Ah  nuvver  could  make  dat  boy  mine  me ; 
he  wouldn't  even  go  to  Sunday  school  'cause  Ah 
wuz  de  Soop'ntinder."  And  even"  this  humorless 
court  had  laughed. 

But  Aunt  Katy  and  Essie  welcomed  Jim  with 
embraces  and  tears,  while  the  self-conscious  Mary 
looked  on  with  moist  eyes.  To  her  he  had  always 
been  a  hero,  and  for  the  last  four  years  she  had 
pictured  him  in  her  imagination  as  bravely  endur 
ing  some  torture  for  the  sake  of  his  "Little  Sis," 
as  he  called  her.  But  the  creature  whom  she  now 
saw  in  the  arms  of  her  mother  and  grandmother, 
was  so  different  from  the  creation  of  her  dreams. 
He  was  cold  and  hard  and  unsentimental.  The  wel 
come  which  had  cost  them  all  so  much  thought  and 
care  and  pains,  did  not  seem  to  appeal  to  him.  In 
deed  he  spoke  as  if  he  did  not  expect  to  stay  with 
them  but  would  go  afar  off.  He  showed  tender 
ness  only  when  he  put  his  arms  about  Mary's 
shoulders  and  patted  her  head,  saying:  "It  was  all 
for  you,  Little  Sis,."  If  there  be  any  sentiment  in 
us,  we  will  love  those  for  whom  we  sacrifice  and 
for  whom  we  suffer.  We  can  love  them  even  bet 
ter  than  they  can  love  us,  for  self-sacrifice  is  both 
the  cause  and  the  effect  of  true  love.  Mother's 
love  is  the  greatest  love  in  the  world, — because 
mother  lays  most  upon  the  sacrificial  altar. 


52  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

They  prevailed  upon  him  to  stay  with  them.  Such 
true  and  loving  hearts  could  win  even  Jim.  He 
seldom  talked  in  the  presence  of  Sam,  but  when 
alone  with  the  other  three,  he  would  often  de 
scribe  bits  of  his  experience  and  observations  in 
the  awful  state  prison,  telling  of  the  rapacity  and 
brutality  of  the  guards  and  keepers.  He  swore 
violently  whenever  any  one  called  the  name  of  El 
liot,  so  that  Aunt  Katy  arid  Essie  and  Mary  never 
talked  in  his  presence  about  the  people  at  the  Big 
House.  But  Sam,  who  liked  to  talk  about  "de 
white  fokes,"  would  occasionally  mention,  testing- 
ly,  "Mr.  Ellyut;"  whereupon  Jim  would  utter  an 
oath  and  seize  his  hat  and  leave  the  cabin. 

Jim  never  spoke  to  Elliot.  Elliot  never  spoke  to 
Jim.  The  ex-convict  managed  to  get  a  job  with 
a  neighboring  planter,  as  labor  was  scarce,  and 
one  day  as  he  was  driving  a  wagon  along  the 
roadside,  he  met  Elliot  on  horseback.  The  road 
was  so  narrow  that  even  a  man  on  horse  could  not 
safely  pass  a  wagon  unless  the  latter  drew  a  bit 
to  the  side.  Jim  drove  straight  ahead  in  the  middle 
of  the  road,  ignoring  the  approach  of  Elliot,  so 
that  he  had  to  turn  his  horse  down  a  steep  em 
bankment  to  escape  the  wagon.  That  evening  Sam 
kept  eyeing  Jim  and  hinting  about  work  and  wages, 
and  finally  wound  up:  "I  jes*  happened  by  de  Big 
House.  Our  white  fokes  needs  mo'  han's,  and  dey 
pays  mor'n  other  white  fokes,  and  Mr.  Ellyut  tol* 
me  to  tell  Jim ." 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  53 

"Go  to  hell !"  said  Jim,  as  he  reached  for  his  hat 
and  walked  out. 

"Ah  ain't  been  to  no  penitenchery,"  said  Sam, 
"an*  ain't    had    hafT    his    opperchoonity    to  learn 
nuthin',  but  I  got  mo'  manners  dan  dat  nigger.  He 
a  wuss  nigger  dan  he  wuz  fo'  dey  sent  him  off." 
*    *    *    *    *    * 

Meanwhile  Mrs.  Elliot  was  receiving  long  let 
ters  from  Madame  Dupree,  telling  of  William's 
arrival  in  Paris,  of  his  studies  and  of  the  fine  im 
pression  which  he  was  making  on  the  French  peo 
ple.  When  letters  came  from  William,  he  invari 
ably  asked  after  Essie  and  her  daughter  and  Aunt 
Katy,  and  often  made  inquiries  about  Jim.  Mrs. 
Elliot  was  in  the  habit  of  reading  these  letters  to 
Aunt  Katy  in  the  kitchen  or  dining  room,  because 
of  the  genuine  interest  which  the  latter  manifested 
in  any  news  from  "Master  William." 

One  day  after  reading  one  of  these  letters,  the 
proud  Mrs.  Elliot  commented:  "I  tell  you,  Aunt 
Katy,  altho  nigger  boys  don't  have  the  same  priv 
ilege  as  white  boys,  still  if  they  had  any  ambition 
to  learn  and  work  and  do  what  they  can  do,  they 
might  make  their  mothers  happy  instead  of  caus 
ing  them  so  much  trouble.  "  Aunt  Katy's  reply 
was  a  speechless  gaze,  which  would  have  been  elo 
quent,  had  Mrs.  Elliot  been  the  wiser.  If  only 
white  people  could  read  the  minds  of  black  people 

.  But  one  day  Aunt  Katy's  patience  suddenly 

gave  way  under  the  unconscious  attack  which  the 


54  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

white  woman  was  continually  making  on  the  black 
grandmother's  secret  knowledge  and  firm  convic 
tions  :  "Mis'  Elliot,  I  don't  b'lieve  any  mo'  in  this 
blood  business.  If  Jim  had  had  the  other  chile's 
chance, — who  knows?  I  heard  you  read  one  day 
from  Master  William's  letter  that  there  was  some 
colored  boys  over  there  from  Georgia  an'  South 
C'liiia,  an'  that  they  done  as  well  as  anybody  in 
their  studies.  Perhaps  those  white  people  over 
there  act  different  toward  colored  people  and  give 
'em  a  better  chance.  Essie  says  the  for'n  white 
folks  in  Paris  treated  her  nicer'n  her  own  white 
folks  treated  her,  an'  ." 

"Katy !"  shouted  Mrs.  Elliot,  dropping  the  sav 
ing  grace  of  "Aunt,"  while  her  face  reddened  and 
almost  bursted,  "at  your  age  and  with  the  training 
you  have  had,  you  ought  to  know  better.  If  God 
had  meant  for  your  race  to  be  like  white  people, 
he  would  not  have  made  you  black !  And  I'll  bet 
those  niggers  that  William  spoke  of,  are  almost 
white  and  have  a  lot  of  white  blood  ." 

"Lot  o'  white  blood!"  shrieked  Aunt  Katy, — "an* 
so  has  Jim!  He  is  certainly  white,  al-most." 

Her  eyes  blazed, — she  was  beside  herself, — she 
was  struggling  against  some  inner  urge  to  disclose 
some  awful  history  or  utter  some  terrifying  proph 
ecy.  Her  very  audacity  amazed  Mrs.  Elliot,  who 
stood  paralyzed  by  anger  and  wounded  pride.  Her 
mind  was  struggling  against  the  impossible  task  of 
conceiving  some  adequate  rebuke  when  Mary  burst 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  55 

• 

in  upon  them :  "O  Aunt  Katy !" — as  she  called  her 
own  grandmother, — "O  Mis'  Elliot !  They  are  after 
him  again, — bloodhounds, — guns !" 

Seizing  the  hand  of  the  excited  girl,  Aunt  Katy 
made  off  for  the  cabin  and  Essie.  As  she  rushed 
out,  she  laughed  the  uncanny  laugh  and  said: 
"Vengeance  of  God!" 

As  the  yelp  of  dogs  and  a  few  scattered  shots 
were  heard,  Mrs.  Elliot  mechanically  paraphrased: 
"The  vengeance  of  the  gods!" 


CHAPTER  VII. 

THE  COAT  AND  THE  HAT 

"The  coat  and  hat  were  found  in  the  cabin  of 
that  nigger  Jim,"  said  the  one-eyed  Brough,  "and 
that  proves  he's  the  criminal." 

"But  the  coat  and  hat  are  not  his,"  suggested 
John  Elliot,  diplomatically;  "they  are  known  to 
be  the  property  of  some  white  man." 

"Makes  no  diff'rence,"  snorted  Brough,  the  mob 
leader,  "he's  the  nigger,  and  his  name  is  hash  this 
time.  He  can't  escape ;  we've  hemmed  him  in  the 
swamp.  Not  even  his  sympathizing  kin  will  be 
able  to  save  his  neck  this  time." 

John  Elliot  was  not  to  be  thus1  insulted,  not  even 
by  another  white  man.  He  reached  for  his  gun : 
"Say  that  I  am  right  in  what  I  think  you  mean, 
and,  damn  you!  I'll  shoot  you  like  a  dog,  you  po' 
white  devil!" 

"O,  I  mean  Essie,"  the  dodging  coward  quickly 
replied,  "she's  trying  her  best  to  lie  him  out  of 
this." 

"Yes,"  said  John  Elliot,  compromised  by  this 
cowardice  of  Brough,  altho  he  knew  that  the  in- 


58  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

sinuation  did  not  refer  to  Essie.  But  with  all  the 
easy  presumptousness  of  the  landowner  class,  he 
continued:  "And  now  you  are  going  to  shut  your 
mouth  and  hear  me  tell  just  what  she  does  say 
about  it.  Then  you  and  these  gentlemen,"  diplo 
matically,  "may  do  as  you  damn  please.  Essie's 
a  nigger,  but  her  story  agrees  in  the  main  points 
with  that  of  the  white  woman.  The  white  woman 
says  that  the  man  who  stopped  her  buggy  and  as 
saulted  her,  was  white ;  and  that  when  he  put  her 
back  into  the  buggy  and  ordered  her  to  drive  on, 
she  heard  another  vehicle  approaching  from  the 
cross-road ;  and  that  later  she  saw  her  assailant 
going  across  a  field,  as  if  frightened  away  without 
his  coat  and  hat.  Now  Essie  says  that  Jim  was 
driving  that  way  and  picked  up  a  coat  and  hat, 
which  he  brought  home." 

To  relieve  the  situation  an  older  member  of  the 
mob  now  spoke  up  in  B  rough's  stead :  "I  don't 
mean  to  make  any  insinuations  or  insulting  re 
marks  at  all,  Mr.  Elliot,  but  I'm  used  to  consist 
ent  lying  on  the  part  of  niggers.  The  uppish  kind 
always  help  each  other, — and  she's  his  mother, 
and  blood  is  thicker'n  water."  And  John  Elliot 
winced.  "The  lady  did  say  that  the  man  was 
white,  but  ain't  Jim  white?"  And  as  the  speaker 
noticed  John  Elliot's  gun-hand  creeping,  he  added 
exegetically :  "I  mean,  ain't  he  a  light  nigger  who 
could  be  mistaken  for  a  white  man  in  the  dark? 
And  yo'  own  darkey  Sam  says  Jim  acted  suspici- 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  59 

otts  when  he  brought  the  coat  and  hat  in,  and  soon 
as  Sam  knew  a  coat  and  hat  figgered  in  the  case, 
he  came  and  told  us." 

"Come  here,  Sam !"  shouted  a  third  member  of 
the  mob, — "here,  nigger,  come  and  tell  Mr.  Elliot 
jus'  what  you  tol'  us." 

That  frightened  wretch  came  forth,  or  rather  was 
thrust  forward  from  the  center  of  the  mob,  which, 
as  a  reward  for  his  miserable  lies,  had  held  him 
like  a  hostage  and  treated  him  almost  as  if  he  were 
the  criminal  himself.  They  had  hinted  again  and 
again  in  his  hearing  that,  if  they  did  not  catch  Jim, 
they  might  try  their  guns  on  "the  first  nigger  they 
could  get  their  hands  on." 

Sam's  statement,  therefore,  was  more  a  plea  for 
his  own  hide  than  for  any  other  purpose :  "Ah 
knowed  it  wuz  Jim, — he  ain't  my  chile,  you  see" — • 
and  when  he  noticed  Elliot's  eyes  batting  fast,  he 
explained :  "Ah  mean,  he's  jes'  only  Essie's  chile. 
An'  jes'  ez  soon  ez  Ah  hyeahs  'bout  de  trouble,  Ah 
sez  ter  myself,  sez  Ah:  'Sam  ain't  gwine  ter  git 
into  no  trouble  'bout  dis  boy.'  'Cause  Ah  done  tried 
ter  make  him  behave  lak  a  good  nigger,  ever  since 
Ah  married  his  mammy.  You  see,  he  ain't  my  chile, 
— jes'  only  Essie's  chile  by  herse'f  erlone,  Ah  mean, 
— >an'  it  ain't  my  fault,  white  fokes,  dat  he  ain't 
raised  right,  an'  " 

"Hurry  up,  nigger !"  shouted  two  or  three  im 
patient  men. 

"Soon  ez  Ah  hyeahd  dat  a  lady  wuz  'sa'lted  and 


60  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

dat  de  white  gen'mens  wuz  lookin'  fer  de  coat  an' 
hat,  Ah  went  straight  an'  tol'  de  white  fakes.  An* 
Ah  tol'  his  mammy  atterwards,  an'  she  done  tol' 
Jim.  An'  she  sez  he  'splain  ter  her  dat  he  ain't 
done  it,  but  she  tell  him  ter  run  'fo'  de  white  fokes 
come.  But  Mr.  Ellyut  kin  bear  me  witness  dat  I 
didn't  marry  her  'till  long  atter  Jim  wuz  borned, 

an' ." 

"Shut  up,  nigger, — come  on !"  And  the  mob 
dragged  him  away  frightened  almost  unto  death 
for  his  life.  Mr.  Elliot  stood  silent.  But  was  he 
convinced  or  compromised? 


CHAPTER  VIII. 

THE  MAN  HUNT 

Who  can  describe  its  fascination,  and  the  mad 
ness?  Hunting  wild  beasts  is  not  to  be  compared 
with  the  hunting  of  a  man.  And  once  indulged  in, 
it  is  seductive,  like  drinking  alcohol  or  eating  hu 
man  flesh.  There  is  more  uncertainty  and  con 
sequently  more  of  the  spirit  of  gamble  in  the  man 
hunt.  The  beast  you  can  figure  out  too  easily ;  you 
can  tell  just  what  he  will  do  under  a  given  set  of 
circumstances.  It  is  more  a  matter  of  science,  and 
the  sensuous  animal  is  but  part  of  your  experimen 
tal  material.  But  a  man, — even  a  poor,  oppressed 
and  imbruted  devil  of  a  man, — has  a  wit  like  yours. 
It  is  not  so  easy  to  figure  him  out,  for  he  is  also 
figuring  you  out.  He  may,  and  he  may  not.  His 
psychology  is  not  a  mere  calculable  thing;  it  is  a 
thing  that  also  calculates.  You  have  to  play  more 
of  a  game  against  the  man.  It  is  thought  against 
thought,  scheme  against  scheme.  Hunger  and  thirst 
do  not  drive  him  from  his  refuge  as  readily  as  it 
drives  a  beast  from  his  lair.  You  must  think  and 
guess  and  doubt,  rather  than  plan  and  calculate 
and  feel  sure.  And  paradoxically  enough,  some 


62  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

strategems  can  be  used  -against  the  man  which  are 
useless  against  the  brute :  for  the  man  has  reason 
and  faith,  ambition  and  sentiment.  A  camouflage, 
a  threat  against  his  mother  or  a  word  from  his 
sweetheart  might  fool  or  rouse  or  tempt  the  man. 
Sentiment  might  betray  the  human,  where  rigid 
instinct  protects  the  animal. 

Colored  men  who  were  friends  or  acquaintances 
of  Jim,  were  compelled  to  go  thru  the  swamp  at 
night,  followed  closely  by  armed  white  men. 
These  Negroes  were  ordered  to  engage  in  conver 
sation,  in  which  they  had  been  drilled  beforehand, 
and  which  was  calculated  to  betray  the  fugitive : 

"Dem  white  fokes  done  got  tired  huntin'  Jim,"  in 
a  loud  voice. 

"Ya-as,  dey  ain't  doin'  much  night  watchin'  now, 
— didn't  see  none  uv  'em  where  we  entered  de 
swamp." 

"Uh-huh !  If  we  could  only  run  across  Jim  now, 
we  could  help  him  out,  couldn't  we?" 

"A'nt  Katy  done  tol'  me  dis  mawnin'  dat  she 
got  a  hunderd  dollars  fer  him  to  run  off  North 
wid,  if  she  kin  git  it  to  him." 

Letters  were  also  dropped  in  different  parts  of 
the  swamp  and  neighboring  woods,  purporting  to 
be  from  Aunt  Katy  or  Essie  or  other  colored  peo 
ple,  telling  Jim  just  when  and  where  he  might  get 
food  and  how  he  might  escape.  Once  a  report  was 
spread  around  that  Jim's  mother,  Essie,  was  very 
sick,  and  that  Mary  was  dvino-.  At  another  time 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  63 

word  was  passed  around  that  Jim  was  not  the 
right  man  after  all,  but  that  the  right  man  had 
been  caught  and  lodged  in  jail. 

The  mob  members,  with  all  their  cunning,  were 
making  two  fundamental  mistakes :  first,  they 
were  using  colored  people,  against  their  will,  as 
the  agents  and  the  medium  of  all  these  lies  and 
attempted  decoys ;  and  second,  they  were  at  the 
same  time  abusing,  bullying  and  maltreating  in 
nocent  colored  people,  so  that  no  Negro  could  pos 
sibly  sympathize  with  the  mob.  It  should  have 
been  expected  that  under  such  conditions  these 
people,  with  their  wonderful  intuition,  would  use 
all  their  cunning  to  foil  the  pursuers. 

One  day  Sam  was  informed  by  -the  mob  that  he 
would  be  sent  into  the  swamp  at  night  to  find  Jim. 
"O  Lawdy  Gawd,  white  fokes,  dat  nigger'll  kill 
me!" 

"Well,  he's  yo'  son,  ain't  he?"  suggested  Brough, 
with  a  general  "haw-haw !" 

The  idea  might  have  been  at  first  a  jest,  but  the 
instant  and  sincere  terror  of  Sam  was  so  delicious 
to  his  tormentors,  that  when  night  came  they  made 
good  the  jest  and  actually  started  Sam  toward  the 
swamp  at  the  points  of  their  guns.  Breaking  un 
der  the  torture,  he  shrieked  aloud,  foamed  at  the 
mouth  and  tore  at  his  own  flesh.  He  was  mad. 
They  shot  him  like  a  dog. 

But  if  we  fail  to  seduce  a  people  or  destroy  a 
man  thru  their  vices,  we  may  still  attack  them  thru 


64  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

their  virtues.  The  devil  sometimes  assails  a  man 
via  his  strong  points  and  makes  his  virtue  his  mis 
fortune.  So  the  man-hunters  began  to  think :  Per 
haps  these  colored  people  are  "traitors ;"  perhaps 
they  are  in  touch  with  Jim ;  they  may  be  warning 
him  against  our  traps ;  possibly  these  colored  peo 
ple  are  doing  for  this  colored  man  exactly  what 
under  similar  circumstances  we  white  people  would 
do  for  any  white  man, — give  him  warning  and 
aid.  There  now,  we  have  it :  We  must  also  fool  these 
people;  they  must  be  made  to  lead  Jim  into  a  trap 
without  knowing  themselves  that  it  is  a  trap. 

That  is,  they  would  betray  these  people  and  this 
fugitive  thru  their  virtues.  The  colored  people  are 
strong  in  sympathy,  and  when  once  they  feel 
deeply,  in  loyalty ;  and  Jim  was  strong  in  physical 
courage  and  in  self-sacrificing  love  for  F.ssie  and 
Mary.  "That's  it,"  said  one  of  the  mob,  "we'll  get 
him  thru  his  womenfolks.  We'll  let  the  niggers 
know  that  we're  fixing  to  give  the  two  wenches 
hell  tomorrow  night,  an'  they'll  be  sure  to  slip  the 
word  along  to  Jim.  He'?  got  a  lot  o'  nerve,  and 
that'll  get  him  out." 

"Yes,  he  always  would  fight  for  the  gal,"  testi 
fied  the  one-eyed  Brough. 

So  the  plot  was  laid.  The  mob,  still  calling  itself 
a  posse  and  assuming  all  law,  issued  a  decree  that 
Essie  and  her  daughter  should  stay  in  the  cabin 
all  the  next  day  and  night  and  that  no  colored 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  65 

person  was  to  go  there  under  pain  of  chastisement 
by  the  posse. 

This  had  the  desired  effect :  it  aroused  the  sin 
cere  curiosity  of  the  colored  people.  What  was 
going  to  be  done  to  these  defenseless  women? 
Negroes  working  around  white  people  became  all 
eyes  and  ears.  And  members  of  the  mob  easily 
managed  to  let  their  servants  overhear  bits  of  the 
plan  :  "They're  good-lookin'  wenches  an'  the  boys 
are  goin'  to  call  on  Jem  tomorrow  night, — a  dozen 
or  so  of  the  young  fellows.  Brough'll  be  with 
'em, — he  ain't  never  forgot  how  he  lost  his  eye." 

"Haw !  haw !  An'  he  wants  more'n  an  eye  for 
his  eye,  don't  he?" 

"An'  after  that  the  boys  are  going  to  burn  the 
cabin  down." 

"After  that  they  won't  be  fit  for  nothin'  but 
burninV  Some  exaggerations  were  thrown  in  to 
fire  the  imagination  of  the  colored  people. 

The  simple-minded,  sympathetic  black  folk  were 
horrified.  Calculations  did  not  go  amiss  as  to  their 
sentiment  and  endeavors  now.  They  slipped  the 
news  to  Jim  by  way  of  "the  grape  vine  telegraph," 
even  while  the  posse  kept  closer  watch  on  the 
swamp.  For  Jim  was  not  in  the  swamp ;  his  col 
ored  friends  had  got  him  out  of  the  swamp  the 
next  day  after  he  went  into  it.  For  many  days  he 
had  been  hidden  in  Elliot's  great  barn  and  was  be 
ing  fed  from  the  kitchen  of  the  Big  House, — with 
out  the  knowledge  of  the  Elliots,  however. 


66  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

The  character  and  courage  of  Jim  also  justified 
the  compliment  which  his  enemies  had  paid  him ; 
for  when  he  heard  that  danger  threatened  Essie, 
and  his  "Little  Sis' "  for  whom  he  had  already 
sacrificed  his  life,  he  resolved  not  to  be  kept  away 
from  them  by  consideration  of  life  or  death  or  hell. 
He  believed  that  the  mob  meant  to  carry  out  the 
diabolical  plot  against  those  whom  he  loved,  be 
cause  the  colored  people  who  reported  it  to  him 
believed  it.  People  who  believe  what  they  say, 
(have  a  way  of  making  others  believe.  But  the 
colored  people  believed  it  only  because  the  whites 
apparently  had  tried  to  keep  them  from  getting 
wind  of  it.  Jim  resolved  therefore  to  rescue  Essie 
and  Mary  or  die.  He  was  watching  for  a  chance. 
He  would  \vait  till  dusk  of  evening.  If  by  that 
time  he  was  given  no  chance,  he  would  take  one. 

What  was  it  that  brought  John  Elliot  wander 
ing  thru  the  great  barn  that  afternoon  ?  Are  there 
unseen  powers  that  sport  with  our  destinies  as  we 
manipulate  the  lives  of  lesser  creatures?  The  barn 
was  nearly  half  a  mile  from  the  Big  House.  Had 
the  actions  of  some  servant  made  Elliot  suspicious, 
or  was  his  troubled  and  wandering  mind  leading 
him?  Was  there  some  soul-liaison,  unrecognized 
by  both  of  them,  between  this  old  man  and  that 
son  of  his  hidden  in  the  hay  loft?  At  any  rate, 
there  came  Elliot  in  his  wide  hat,  long  coat  and 
gray  trousers.  From  his  lair  in  the  loft  Jim  could 
see  him.  The  fugitive's  mind  worked  fast :  That 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  67 

hat,  coat,  trousers, — they  would  be  passports. — The 
hunted  man  is  more  dangerous  than  the  hunted 
animal. — But  was  Elliot  armed,  as  usual?  Jim 
evolved  a  plan.  He  climbed  rapidly  down  and 
walked  out  of  the  barn  right  before  the  astonished 
eyes  of  Elliot. 

"Stop!"  demanded  Elliot,  reaching  for  his  hip- 
pocket.  But  Jim  had  passed  out  of  the  door.  He 
did  not  attempt  to  run  but  stepped  behind  the  great 
tree  that  stood  in  the  barnyard  on  the  side  farthest 
from  the  Big  House.  This  looked  pacific  to  John 
Elliot,  so  he  did  not  draw  his  gun:  "Now,  Jim, 
you've  got  to  surrender." 

"Surrender  hell !"  said  Jim.  to  Elliot's  great  ir 
ritation.  And  he  let  his  pursuer  see  him  reach  out 
from  behind  the  tree  and  seize  a  huge  billet  of 
wood.  This  angered  Elliot.  Jim  meant  to  anger 
him.  To  enrage  a  man  is  often  the  first  step  to 
ward  overcoming  him. 

Out  flashed  the  ubiquitous  Southern  gun:  "What 
are  you  going  to  do  with  that  club,  nigger?" 

"I  may  kill  you  with  it, — you  white  devil !"  hissed 
the  fugitive. 

How  the  hot  blood  surged  to  Elliot's  head.  No 
Negro  ever  said  as  much  to  a  white  man  and  lived, 
— at  least  not  within  the  borders  of  Arkansas  and 
the  memory  of  John  Elliot.  He  was  too  angry 
to  reply  to  this  threat  and  insult.  He  simply  be- 
gan  to  move  around  the  tree  brandishing  his  gun 
and  trying  to  get  a  good  aim  at  the  object  of  his 


68  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

wrath.  This  was  the  battle  which  Jim  wanted  to 
provoke.  He  stuck  close  to  the  tree,  while  Elliot 
moved  around  at  a  distance  but  did  not  risk  coming 
closer.  The  younger  man  moved  easily  in  the 
smaller  circle ;  the  raging  old  man  found  it  more 
difficult  to  keep  pace  in  the  larger  circle.  How 
exasperating  it  is  for  one  whom  we  consider  in 
ferior  to  first  defy  us  and  then  to  outwit  us.  Fin 
ally  in  a  blind  rage  John  Elliot  fired  two  shots, 
cutting  the  bark  of  the  tree  on  his  right  and  at 
Jim's  left,  as  the  two  men  facing  each  other  moved 
in  their  orbits  from  right  to  left. 

These  shots  were  a  signal  to  the  quick-witted 
fugitive.  He  was  waiting  for  some  such  sign.  It 
indicated  that  his  pursuer  had  become  desperate, 
and  therefore  indiscrete  and  less  clear  in  judgment. 
John  Elliot  had  the  gun.  but  cunning  is  the  weapon 
of  the  weak  and  of  the  unarmed.  This  was  the 
moment  for  the  ruse :  he  hung  his  hat  on  the  end 
of  his  club,  holding  it  in  his  left,  so  that  Elliot 
might  see  only  the  crown  of  the  hat  Another 
shot  rang  out,  a  piece  flew  from  the  crown  of  the 
hat,  and  Jim  fell  backward  to  the  ground,  slapping 
the  hat  quickly  on  his  head.  He  pressed  his  palm 
over  the  rift  in  its  crown  and  closed  his  eyes  as 
if  in  great  pain.  Elliot  rushed  forward:  "It  was 
your  own  fault :  I  didn't  want  to  shoot  you."  And 
as  he  stooped  to  pull  Jim's  hand  from  the  top  of 
his  head,  the  prostrate  man  with  the  irresistible- 
ness  of  the  unexpected  suddenly  jerked  both  of 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  69 

Elliot's  legs  from  under  him ;  and  as  the  latter 
fell,  the  gun  flew  from  his  hand.  The  greater 
agility  of  the  younger  man  brought  him  first  to 
his  feet  and  he  got  possession  of  the  gun.  He 
ordered  Elliot  to  go  immediately  into  the  barn. 
Outwitted  but  haughty,  Elliot  refused  to  utter  a 
word,  but  he  obeyed  the  command,  for  there  was 
a  light  in  Jim's  eye  which  no  rational  creature 
would  disregard. 

Inside  the  barn,  Jim  for  the  first  time  in  his  life 
said  to  this  proud  baron  what  both  of  them  thought 
to  be  the  truth :  "John  Elliot,  I  'am  your  bastard 
son.  That  is  the  only  reason  why  I  am  not  goin' 
to  kill  you.  It  is  not  because  I  think  you  deserve 
to  live  nor  that  I  fear  to  die.  If  I  were  not  your 
son,  I  would  kill  you  for  your  treatment  of  my 
mother.  But  if  any  harm  comes  to  her  now,  or 
to  my  sister  I  will  kill  you  in  broad  daylight  if 
necessary,  even  at  the  door  of  the  jail  or  at  the 
gate  of  hell, — your  own  son  with  your  own  gun. 
For  the  present  I  only  want  your  clothes, — hat, 
coat  and  pants.  Take  'em  off.  You  can  put  on 
these, — if  you  want  to." 

Elliot,  proudly  silent,  gave  up  his  own  clothes, 
but  appeared  not  to  see  the  coat  which  Jim  held 
out  to  him. 

"And  now  I'll  tie  you  up  in  the  loft,  so  you  can't 
get  loose,  but  you  can  call  for  help  later.  I  will 
tell  you  when  to  call,  and  don't  call  too  soon  or 
you  won't  get  the  help.  You  are  to  stay  here  all 


70  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

night.  I  have  staid  here  many  nights.  Do  not 
call  or  notify  any  of  the  boys  when  they  feed  and 
put  up  this  evenin'.  I  will  be  watchin',  and  if  I 
see  the  least  sign  that  they  have  found  you  I  will 
come  out  and  kill  you  right  before  their  faces.  I 
ain't  anxious  to  escape  and  I  ain't  hankerin'  to- 
live.  I'm  tryin'  my  best  to  get  my  mammy  and 
Little  Sis'  away  from  here  tonight ;  and  if  we  get 

away  all  right,  it  may  save  you  some  trouble." 
****** 

That  evening  after  sundown  but  before  dark, 
when  his  colored  peons  were  putting  up  their  mules 
and  feeding  and  milking,  Elliot  could  overhear 
them  discussing  the  man-hunt  and  Jim  and  him 
self.  He  was  amazed  >at  the  accurateness  of  the 
knowledge  of  these  semi-slaves  and  reddened  un 
seen  at  some  of  the  compliments  he  heard  paid  to 
himself.  But  he  uttered  not  a  word  and  scarcely 
dared  to  breathe,  lest  he  innocently  betray  his  in 
voluntary  hiding  place ;  for  he  knew  that  death, 
fearless  death,  had  his  eye  on  him. 

Night  came  on,  and  as  her  'husband  was  not  at 
home  by  eleven  o'clock,  Mrs.  Elliot  phoned  an 
inquiry  to  the  plantation  storekeeper  at  the  little 
village  square.  She  was  informed  that  her  hus 
band  had  driven  up  in  front  of  the  store  in  the 
earlier  part  of  the  night ;  that  he  did  not  get  out 
but  ordered  certain  provisions  brought  out  to  'his 
car,  and  told  the  clerk  to  tell  Mrs.  Elliot,  if  she 
inquired,  that  he  was  driving  to  Augusta,  twelve 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  71 

or  fifteen  miles  away,  and  might  possibly  not  re 
turn  till  morning.  The  clerk  remarked  that  there 
were  several  other  people  in  the  back  of  the  auto 
mobile. 

Why  had  he  not  told  her  himself  and  earlier? 
The  wife  had  forebodings.  "Where  is  Aunt  Ka»ty?" 
"She  went  to  see  Essie  and  Mary,  ma'm,  d'rectly 
after  supper."  Yes,  Mrs.  Elliot  remembered  hear 
ing  her  vow  that  she  would  spend  the  next  two 
nights  in  the  cabin  with  her  "chillun,  and  see  if 
any  po'  white  trash  dared  to  touch  'em." 

Mrs.  Elliot  retired  and  dreamed  disturbing 
dreams :  William  was  a  little  boy  again.  He  had 
fallen  into  a  deep  well.  Aunt  Katy  and  Essie  were 
doing  their  best  to  rescue  him  with  a  long  rope ; 
but  every  time  they  got  him  near  the  top  of  the 
well,  some  white  person  of  a  crowd  who  stood 
near,  would  cut  the  rope  so  that  WTilliam  would 
drop  back,  and  the  shortened  rope  would  make  it 
more  difficult  for  the  struggling  women  to  reach 
him  next  time.  Somehow,  as  is  the  horror  of 
dreams,  the  dreamer  seemed  spellbound  against 
rendering  aid  and  dumb  to  protest,  when  finally 
the  likeness  of  John  Elliot  rushed  up  to  lend  a 
hand  for  the  rescue,  and  suddenly  and  as  if  against 
his  will  a  knife  appeared  in  his  hand  and  he  him 
self  cut  the  rope  short  from  the  hands  of  the  de 
spairing  women.  And  the  dreamer  was  struggling 
against  her  dumbness  and  numbness  for  freedom 
to  move  or  shriek,  when  


72  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

"'Scuse  me,  Mis'  Ellyut,  fer  wakin'  yo'  so 
early,"  a  servant  was  saying  with  the  best  effort 
at  the  English,  "but  Mr.  Brough  is  hyeah,  an'  he 
sez  he  jes'  hafter  speak  ter  yo'  at  oncet." 

What  was  wrong?  Brough?  A  bad  omen  in  all 
this  trouble  for  years.  She  hurried  to  dress  par 
tially,  and  went  to  the  sitting  room  where  she  was 
confronted  by  the  one-eyed  mob-leader  and  two 
other  hard-looking  men. 

"Pardon,  Madam,"  one  of  them  began  as  they 
observed  her  honestly  puzzled  mien,  "but  we  won 
der  if  you  can  tell  us  where  Mr.  Elliot  has  gone 
and  what  he  has  gone  for." 

This  wounded  her  pride  more  than  was  intended, 
for  in  very  truth  she  did  not  know.  She  parried: 
"And  pray  what  is  that  to  you?"  as  she  eyed 
Brough  haughtily  and  suspiciously. 

"Well,  Madam,  to  be  plain  and  brief,"  retorted 
that  worthy,  "we've  just  driven  to  Augusta  to  make 
sure,  and  we  find  that  he  or  somebody  just  like 
him  left  on  the  ten-thirty  train  for  Missouri  by  the 
Iron  Mountain  Railroad, — and  what's  more,"  he 
now  spoke  maliciously  and  with  curling  lips,  "he 
carried  the  old  nigger  woman  and  Essie  and  the 
other  little  wench  with  him.  Did  you  know  they 
were  gone?" 

This  was  a  moment  of  trial  for  Mrs.  Elliot.  The 
ring  of  triumph  in  Brough's  voice  annoyed  her.  But 
it  also  aroused  her  Bourbon  blood  which  resents 
the  encroachments  of  "po'  white  trash"  even  more 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  73 

than  the  familiarity  of  "niggers."  She  deliberately 
accepted  the  challenge  with  the  simple  reply :  "Ifs 
a  lie!" 

But  when  -a  rude  man  has  the  advantage  which 
Brough  thought  he  had,  he  can  afford  to  be  gen 
erous,  which  he  translates  into  being  more  delib 
erately  and  more  successfully  cruel.  So  rudely 
ignoring  her  contempt  and  disregarding  her  excite 
ment,  he  coolly  continued :  "When  I  heard  he  was 
driving  to  town  with  female  parties  in  his  car,  /  got 
suspicious.  I  sent  my  nigger  to  the  cabin  and  no 
body  answered  when  he  knocked.  Then  we  went 
there  after  midnight  and  broke  in.  The  wenches 
were  not  there,  and  some  of  your  other  niggers 
told  us  the  old  woman  was  not  at  the  Big  House 
and  that  Elliot  was  not  at  home.  We  drove  as  fast 
as  we  could  to  Augusta  to  investigate  and ." 

"O  Mis'  Ellyut.  Marse  Ellyut  sez  sen'  him  some 
clo'es  to  the  big  barn  quick,  an'  he  done  toT  me  to 
tell  yo'  he'll  be  hyeah  right  away!" 

The  proud  matron  now  looked  upon  the  three 
confused  men  with  the  anger  of  a  tigress.  No 
words  accompanied  that  look.  No  words  were  ade 
quate  to  accompany  it.  Her  scorn  was  ineffable, — 
but  mingled  with  amazement,  doubt  and  fear.  Com 
manding  the  excited  servant  to  follow  her,  she 
hurried  into  a  room  and  returned  with  a  suit  of 
Elliot's  clothes.  Brough  and  'his  men  followed  her 
hurried  footsteps  to  the  barn,  where  they  remain- 


74  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

ed  outside  with  the  others  while  she  went  in  to 
find  Elliot. 

When  the  landlord  emerged  from  his  humiliating 
confinement,  his  anger  was  consuming:  "The 
damned  brute  caught  me  here  at  about  three  in 
the  afternoon.  Tied  me  in  the  loft.  Took  my 
clothes.  Left  his  rags  and  ran  off."  He  added 
some  words  of  fire  but  did  not  give  the  other  de 
tails  of  the  evening's  transactions. 

"That  explains  all,"  said  B rough  quickly.  "He 
and  the  nigger  women  are  on  their  way  North. 
We  must  wire  the  governor  and  have  them  head 
ed  off." 

"They  stole  my  car/'*  said  Elliot,  who  had  been 
tlaking  with  Mrs.  Elliot,  "they  all  ought  to  be  sent 
to  jail,  and  that  dangerous  nigger  Jim  should  be 
lynched!" 

"Right— O!"  shouted  Brough. 

And  the  man-hunt  became  statewide  and  almost 
national. 


CHAPTER  IX. 

THE  TATTOO  AND  THE  SCAR 

What  a  wonderful  thing  is  organization  when 
inspired  by  a  feeling  of  racial  solidarity.  No  white 
man  save  his  immediate  oppressors  seemed  inter 
ested  in  Jim,  the  peon.  But  Jim,  'the  "bad  nigger," 
the  fugitive,  the  alleged  rapist,  attracted  the  at 
tention  of  the  governments  of  half  a  dozen  neigh 
boring  states  and  of  the  whole  white  world  thru 
the  associated  press.  Who  can  calculate  the  value 
of  the  money  and  the  time  spent  in  efforts  to  ap 
prehend  this  "criminal?"  And  who  can  refrain 
from  speculating  as  to  how  much  more  good  even 
the  one  hundredth  part  of  that  money  and  time  and 
attention  might  have  accomplished,  had  they  been 
bestowed  on  the  education  and  training  of  this 
human  being  thru  his  childhood  and  youth?  With 
in  a  few  hours  the  great  press  had  made  this  un 
fortunate  and  unknown  creature  notorious.  A 
special  representative  of  the  Little  Rock  news 
papers  had  visited  the  scene  and  published  thrill 
ing  myths  of  this  almost  superhuman  demon,  "a 
very  light-skinned  Negro."  Not  a  single  word, 


76  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

however,  was  offered  in  explanation  of  his  lightness 
of  skin.  The  papers  naturally  g-ot  things  a  bit 
mixed  up,  and  told  how  *'Jim,"  a  mongrel  creature 
with  no  surname,  had  betrayed  the  confidence  of 
his  employer,  John  Elliot,  a  prominent  white  plant 
er;  had  criminally  assaulted  this  planter's  little 
daughter ;  and  that  the  child  was  hardly  expected 
to  live.  Then  he  was  credited  with  having  attempt 
ed  to  foment  a  general  uprising  among  the  blacks 
and  overthrow  the  government  of  white  people  and 
force  upon  them  "social  equality"  and  other  hor 
rors.  Failing  in  this  because  of  the  courage  and 
generalship  of  one  "Colonel"  Brough,  he  had  then 
attempted  to  abduct  the  wealthy  planter,  John  El 
liot,  as  a  hostage ;  and  had  held  him  a  prisoner  for 
several  days  until  the  insurrectionist  was  forced 
to  retreat  by  a  sudden  onslaught  from  Brough; 
whereupon  he  fled  in  stolen  "automobiles,"  com 
pelling  a  few  blacks  at  the  point  of  his  gun  to 
follow  him.  One  far-away  Northern  editor,  inno 
cently  reflecting  all  these  lies  and  fictions,  said  that 
"this  hybrid,  who  is  perhaps  Caucasian  and  Indian 
rather  than  Negro,  is  the  Villa  of  Arkansas." 

The  governor  of  Missouri  had  dispatched  officers 
to  Poplar  Bluff  to  search  every  train  and  take  this 
outlaw,  dead  or  alive.  But  the  governor  of  Ar 
kansas  had  trains  stopped  and  searched  at  Hoxie 
before  they  entered  Missouri.  In  their  haste  and 
excitement  orders  had  been  issued  from  Little  Rock 
only  for  the  arrest  of  Jim,  "a  very  bright  mulatto 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  77 

with  Anglo-Saxon  features,  intelligent,  probably 
passing  for  white."  But  when  Aunt  Katy  saw 
them  overpowering  Jim,  she  joined  promptly  in  the 
fight  and  was  also  seized  and  held  by  the  officers. 
The  lively  fight  put  up  by  Jim  and  Aunt  Katy  at 
tracted  all  attention  to  themselves,  so  that  Essie 
and  Mary  were  unnoticed.  In  the  confusion  they 
were  left  on  the  train  and  escaped  into  Missouri. 

The  captives  were  hurried  back  to  the  place 
from  which  they  had  escaped.  What  a  gala  day 
in  all  that  country  side  when  the  news  spread : 
"They  caught  him!"  What  glad  tidings:  "They 
got  that  nigger!"  It  was  the  merry  greeting  of 
every  little  white  school  child :  "Gee !  won't  they 
lynch  him  tho?"  Nobody  seemed  to  have  the  re 
motest  idea  of  courts,  trials  and  convictions.  It 
was  like  as  if  a  wild  beast,  dangerous  to  the  whole 
community,  had  be>en  trapped,  and  everybody  was 
to  go  now  and  witness  its  slaughter  and  rejoice. 

When  Jim  and  Aunt  Katy  were  brought  back  to 
the  little  village  or  business  center  of  the  planta 
tions,  bells  were  rung,  guns  were  fired,  and  every 
body,  even  the  colored  people,  turned  out  as  a 
matter  of  course  to  see.  Returning  heroes  crowned 
with  the  laurel  of  victory  could  not  have  attracted 
more  attention.  But  these  were  lodged  in  jail. 
There  seemed  to  be  perfect  harmony  and  goodwill 
between  the  officers  of  the  law  and  the  people.  A 
certain  spirit  of  preparation  was  in  the  air.  People 
ate  their  suppers  hurriedly,  if  they  ate  at  all.  Yes, 


78  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

they  were  to  witness  the  biggest  event  in  the  his 
tory  of  that  village, — a  double  lynching, — and  "both 
a  nigger  man  and  a  nigger  wench/'  Poor  old  Aunt 
Kaiy,  to  whose  age  the  last  few  days  had  seemed 
to  aad  as  many  years,  had  grown  equally  as  much 
in  fame.  Rumor  had  made  of  her  a  great  sorceress 
and  really  the  arch-fiend  in  the  whole  deviltry, — 
whatever  it  was.  For  most  of  the  gathering  mob 
could  not  tell  just  what  the  crime  was.  Of  course 
murder  and  rape  and  "little  white  girls"  were  mixed 
up  in  it ;  but  just  w'ho,  when,  how  many  and  how 
much,  nobody  had  clearly  in  mind.  But  a  con 
viction  and  a  determination  possessed  all  minds, 
and  doubt  would  have  been  insanity. 

And  most  of  these  people,  nearly  all  of  them, 
did  not  feel  that  anything  wrong  Avas  about  to  be 
done,  but  something  gloriously  right  or  vindica 
tory,  almost  religious  and  sacred.  Generations  be 
fore,  men  had  not  felt  that  anything  was  going 
wrong  in  New  England  when  they  burned  wrin 
kled  old  women  for  witches.  Those  who  were  not 
to  be  the  performers  or  participants,  were  to  be  the 
audience  or  the  "fans,"  as  at  ball  games  or  bull 
fights.  The  relative  merits  of  hanging  or  shoot 
ing  or  burning  were  freely  discussed.  Finally  a 
compromise  plan  was  hit  upon :  they  were  to  be 
taken  out  to  the  back  of  Elliot's  barn,  to  the  tree 
where  Jim,  as  rumor  now  ran,  had  done  his  best 
to  "murder  old  man  Elliot."  There  'they  were  to 
be  'hung  and  shot ;  and  then  they  would  be  dragged 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  79 

back  to  the  village  square  and  burned.  This  pro 
gram  would  satisfy  all  reasonable  tastes. — A  huge 
pile  of  boards,  boxes,  pine  knots,  and  straw  was  in 

evidence  before  nightfall. 

****** 

Meanwhile  what  other  fates  were  at  work  among 
what  other  people  in  what  other  parts  of  tihe 
world?  William  Elliot  was  doing  service  in  the 
French  army  and  had  requested  his  aunt,  Madame 
Dupree,  to  read  all  his  mail  from  America  before 
sending  it  to  him.  This  was  partly  a  precaution 
because  his  mother  often  sent  messages  in  letters 
to  him  for  her  sister,  and  also  because  he  hoped 
that  his  aunt  might  save  him  much  time  by  reply 
ing  immediately  to  some  of  these  letters.  And  so 
it  happened  that  comfortably  seating  herself  in 
the  boudoir  of  her  Paris  home,  Madame  opened 
and  read  the  following  letter,  stirring  and  moving 
herself  occasionally  to  see  if  she  were  really 
awake : 

"Dere  master  William,  i  no  you  will  fergive  yo 
own  mammy,  an  i  you  because  i  am  a  por  mizzer- 
able  creetur,  an  has  nobody  in  this  worl  but  Essie 
an  you,  an  Jim.  An  the  one  you  thinks  you  be 
long  to,  aint  yo  ma.  She  red  all  yo  letters  to  me 
an  i  no  ther  aint  no  coller  line  no  race  hate  in 
france,  an  if  you  no  the  truth  you  wood  hep  yo 
own  mammy  an  granny  out  from  here,  you  not 
niiss  Elliotts  babie  i  done  it  mysef.  i  can  explaine 


80  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

to  you  Jim  is  hern.  You  wuz  put  in  his  place 
when  you  wuz  to  little  babes,  yo  sister  Mary  do 
not  no.  i  rite  mysef,  she  direct  envellup  for  me. 
you  lernd  nouff  in  that  free  cuntry  to  no  collor 
don't  count  an  you  wont  mine  heppin  yo  own 
mammy  an  me  an  yo  sister  Mary.  The  burnt 
chile  wuz  hern  mis  Elliotts,  i  can  prove,  if  you 
sen  for  us. 

"Essie  nose;  i  jes  tole  her.  but  she  wont  rite 
for  fere  hurtin  you.  She  dont  no  i  rite,  you  sen 
letter  in  my  name. 

"yo   own  granma, 

"KATY    PORTER." 

With  the  swiftness  of  those  who  are  fired  with 
desperate  purpose,  Madame  Dttpree  made  plans 
at  once  to  visit  America  and  her  sisters.  Mon 
sieur  Dupree  had  often  suggested  that  she  do  so; 
and  now  for  fear  that  she  might  change  her  mind 
he  refrained  from  expressing  surprise  or  asking 
any  questions  about  her  sudden  decision. 

S'he  would  sail  tomorrow.  She  was  afire — she 
wanted  to  telegraph  William,— but  no, — was  it 
true?  And  then  she  remembered  how  dark  he 
seemed,  and — what  she  had  been  praising  in  him  as 
a  handsome  roundness  of  feature.  Could  it  be  true  ? 
What  had  the  other  child  become?  He  must  be 
a  man  as  old  as  William.  What  good  would  it 
do  to  prove  this  wretched  thing?  Should  she  not 
drop  it?  It  made  no  difference — in  France. — She 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  81 

remembered  that  she  had, never  spoken  to  William 
about  that  tattoo, — had  never  heard  him  speak  of 
it.  Her  mind  ran  repeatedly  thru  all  the  events 
of  her  visit  with  the  Elliot's  over  twenty  years 
ago 

With  all  this  tumult  in  her  soul  she  sailed  out 
upon  the  tumul)tuous  Atlantic.  And  then  alone 
with  the  great  lonesomeness  of  being  one  among 
many  strangers,  and  like  an  atom  on  the  inhos 
pitable  and  interminable  ocean,  she  became  still 
more  introspective  and  doubtful  of  the  wisdom 
of  her  way:  Should  she  not  have  seen  William? 
Should  she  not  have  asked  the  advice  of  Mr. 
Dupree?  The  French  people  seem  so  cool  and 
sensible  about  such  things. — Should  she  not  have 
sent  the  letter  to  her  sister?  Or  to  her  New 
Orleans  sister  and  gotten  her  viewpoint?  Should 
she  not  have  destroyed  the  letter  altogether  and 
then  written  Aunt  Katy  a  threat  in  her  own  name, — 
or  a  complete  rejection  and  signed  the  name  of 
William  to  it?  That  might  have  stopped  Aunt 
Katy  from  ever  writing  again. — Perhaps  she  might 
still  do  something  like  that.  But  how  could  she 
ever  explain  her  sudden  coming?  And  how  could 
she  ever  keep  such  a  secret  anyway? — O,  the  fas 
cination  with  which  fate  draws  us  on — to  see  and 
to  know  fully.  The  victim  tends  to  ensnare  him 
self.  The  criminal  tends  to  become  his  own  be 
trayer,  his  own  judge,  and  sometimes  his  own  ex 
ecutioner. 


82  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

There  is  humor  in  fate ;  and  irony  and  sarcasm. 
When  she  reached  Augusta,  she  engaged  a  man 
to  drive  her  out  to  "Elliot's  Place."  This  man 
having  agreed  to  do  so  for  a  very  moderate  fee, 
noticed  her  surprise  and  explained :  "O,  me  an' 
some  o'  the  boys  wuz  goin'  aout  anyhaow  this 
evenin' — some  niggers  air  to  be  lynched  out  thare 
to-night."  To  this  she  made  no  reply:  it  made 
'her  feel  faint ;  she  remembered  Paris  and  civili 
zation  :  the  contrast  was  humiliating.  She  mused : 
"Can  it  be,  O,  can  it  be  that  my  own  nephew, 
my  real  nephew  is  a  member  of  a  group  that  can 
be— lynched?" 

The  Elliots  had  been  silent  during  the  awful 
preparations  of  jthat  daly.  Silence  does  \not  al 
ways  mean  consent ;  it  is  sometimes  the  expres 
sion  of  unwilling  acquiescence,  or  helplessness,  or 
fear.  The  better  South  has  been  almost  absolutely 
silent  during  half  a  century  of  lynch  law, — and 
even  now  is  but  barely  audible. — When  Jim  and 
Aunt  Katy  were  led  by  the  mob  to  the  tree  back 
of  Elliot's  barn,  he  went  out  apparently  to  pro 
test,  tho  he  knew  the  futlity  of  protest  at  this 
stage  of  the  proceedings.  The  causes  of  this  pres 
ent  storm  had  been  operating  for  days  and  weeks 
and  years.  The  seed  of  long  ago  had  now  become 
a  fruit. 

After  he  had  gone  out,  Madame  Dupree  came 
in.  She  found  Mrs.  Elliot  alone,  pale  and  haggard, 
and  staring  wildly  from  the  easy  chair  in  which 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  83 

she  sat  and  from  which  she  seemed  unable  to  rise. 
She  had  been  prostrated  by  the  terrible  events  of 
the  day.  and  altho  her  sister  had  wired  from  New 
York  and  phoned  hastily  from  Augusta,  she  was 
yet  puzzled  by  the  suddenness  and  the  coincidences 
of  this  visit.  "O,  mv  good  sister,  you  have  come. 
Ii  is  horrrible ;  I  always  said  no  good  would  come 
of  it,  and  now  Jim  and  Aunt  Katy " 

Madame  Dupree,  because  of  what  was  in  her  own 
mind,  anticipated  and  misinterpreted  the  allusions 
of  her  sister,  and  interrupted:  'Then  you  know 
about  it?  Then  it  is  true?" 

Mrs.  Elliott,  still  busy  with  her  own  thoughts, 
continued:  "Have  they  told  you?  O,  it  is  terrible' 
It  will  spoil  your  visit ;  I  am  sorry  you  came  into 
it." 

Madame  Dupree  fell  limp  into  a  great  chair,  and 
to  relieve  herself  and  her  sister  of  the  pain  of 
further  speech,  she  handed  Mrs.  Elliott  Aunt  Katy's 
letter,  to  show  the  source  and  the  extent  of  her 
knowledge  of  the  case,  and  the  cause  of  her  unex 
pected  visit  to  America. 

What  pen  can  describe  the  infinite  agony  of  that 
minute?  The  stricken  mother  jumped  to  her  feet 
with  the  stare  of  madness  in  her  eyes :  "O  God 
of  Vengeance !  I  mean  they  are  lynching  'him 
now — Jim — William  !" 

Shots  and  yells  rang  out,  as  if  to  punctuate  this 
terrible  announcement  and  interpret  it  to  the  be 
wildered  mind  of  Madame  Dupree.  Mrs.  Elliot 


84  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

bounded  thru  the  door  like  a  bereaved  mother 
lioness,  and  her  sister  followed.  When  they  reach 
ed  the  edge  of  the  mob,  they  could  see  dangling 
under  the  tree  a  few  feet  from  the  ground  what 
had  been  a  human  body  and  was  now  a  mass  of 
torn  flesh  and  tattered  clothes.  Buckshot  and  rifle 
ball  had  rioted  thru  this  human  form. 

And  there  was  Aunt  Katy  standing  with  her  back 
to  the  tree  near  the  body,  and  holding  the  crowd 
at  bay  with  a  double-barreled  shot  gun  which  she 
had  evidently  managed  to  seize  during  the  excite 
ment  attending  the  shooting  of  Jim.  "I  told  you 
to  keep  the  old  witch  tied !"  said  a  voice. — With  a 
fierce  look  of  the  African  jungle,  more  feline  than 
human,  and  with  a  coolness  which  for  the  moment 
commanded  universal  regard,  she  was  saying  in 
her  dialect :  "I  do  not  want  to  kill.  I  do  not  want 
to  live.  I  mean  to  tell  John  Elliot :  His  own  son  has 
been  killed!" 

"We  know  that,"  put  in  Brough. 

"I  mean  Mis'  Elliot's  son.  I  can  prove  it.  I  want 
to  prove  it  to  John  Elliot  and  die !  She  did  not 
know  but  I  knew  that  her  child  had  a  blue  mark 
under  its  arm.  This  is  her  child.  Look  and  see. 
William  in  France  is  Essie's  child.  I  changed  them 
when  yo'  child  got  burned,  when  you  went  off  to 
France.  Ha!  ha!  ha!"  And  in  the  light  of  torch 
and  lantern  she  pointed  an  inexorable  finger  at 
John  Elliot. 

The  mob  stood  silent  for  a  moment,  as  if  under 


The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods  85 

the  spell  of  a  real  witch.  A  voice  broke  the  spell : 
"It's  a  damned  lie  !"  It  was  the  voice  of  John  Elliot. 
The  mob.  as  if  released  from  the  spell  by  the  magic 
of  this  oath,  was  about  to  make  a  desperate  move 
on  Aunt  Katy.  when  a  female  voice  put  in :  "I  can 
tell.  I  am  William's  aunt  from  France.  I  tattooed 
his  arm  when  he  was  an  infant." 

Ignoring  Aunt  Katy  for  the  moment,  Brough, 
the  mob  leader,  took  a  lantern  and  led  the  new 
comer  to  the  dangling  figure.  Trembling,  she  lift 
ed  the  mutilated  arm,  pushed  up  the  remnant  of 
a  blood  soaked  sleeve,  and  fell  fainting  as  she  said : 
"The  tattoo!  It— is— true!" 

This  sudden  turn  of  affairs  killed  the  enthusiasm 
of  the  mob.  And  while  attention  was  diverted 
from  her,  Aunt  Katy  slipped  away,  and  a  heavy 
plunge  was  heard  in  the  great  cistern  that  stood 
near. 

Mrs.  Elliot  never  regained  her  reason.  "Ven 
geance  of  the  Gods!"  is  her  only  coherent  utter 
ance. 

John  Elliot  is  opposed  to  lynching,  and  has  spok 
en  sentiments  concerning  miscegenation,  interrac 
ial  bastardy  and  "social  equality,"  which  make  him 
somewhat  unpopular  in  Arkansas. 

The  boy  in  France,  so  it  is  rumored,  has  been 
given  a  liberal  portion  of  the  Elliot  money. 

When  Essie  and  Mary  reached  St.  Louis,  they 
were  arrested  and  their  extradition  was  demanded 
of  the  executive  of  that  state.  A  great  national 


86  The  Vengeance  of  the  Gods 

organization  of  colored  people  and  liberal-minded 
whites  immediately  began  a  legal  battle  to  pre 
vent  the  return  of  these  women  to  Arkansas.  Their 
case,  however,  was  seemingly  hopeless,  as  the  gov 
ernor  of  Arkansas  had  pledged  "protection  and  a 
fair  trial,"  when  suddenly  the  governor  of  Mis 
souri  announced  that  extradition  was  denied.  Those 
close  to  the  governor  say  that  he  received  a  letter 
from  the  great  Arkansas  planter  who  seemed  to 
be  the  center  of  the  trouble  and  whose  name  had 
been  prominent  in  all  dispatches,  and  that  this  let 
ter  said  that  it  was  all  a  mistake  to  charge  the 
two  women  with  any  connection  with  the  crimes, 
that  they  were  innocent,  and  that  they  could  not 
secure  justice  and  might  be  mobbed  if  they  were 
sent  back. — They  are  living  in  France  with  William 
Elliot,  a  captain  in  the  French  Army. 

Aunt  Katy  was  never  removed  from  the  grave 
she  had  chosen.  The  cistern  was  filled  up  with 
rocks  and  soil,  and  the  resultant  crater  is  known 
to-day  as  "Witch's  Hole"  where  a  great  "conjure 
woman"  or  sorceress  is  said  to  have  disappeared. 


THE  SUPERIOR  RACE 

Why  is  it  that  Jefferson  D.  Jones,  Professor  of 
Anthropology  in  the  Mobile  Institute,  is  now  so 
singularly  silent  or  noncommittal  whenever  the  in 
herent  inferiority  of  the  Negro  is  being  discussed 
in  the  various  clubs  of  which  he  is  a  member,  or 
at  the  social  functions  where  he  is  a  guest?  Pre 
viously  he  has  always  taken  the  lead  in  these  dis- 
cusions.  Indeed  he  had  a  hundred  times  demon 
strated,  anthropologically,  that  the  Negro  is  not 
only  inferior  but  must  forever  remain  so,  "show- 
ing  conclusively,"  as  a  local  editor  said,  "that  al- 
tho  the  theory  of  evolution  may  prove  that  the 
white  man,  the  nigger,  the  monkey  land  other 
mammalians  sprung  from  some  common  origin,  still 
the  white  man  is  the  only  one  who  has  a  soul,  be 
cause  the  white  man  keeps  on  developing,  while  the 
monkey  and  the  nigger  have  run  into  a  sort  of 
evolutionary  cul-de-sac."  A  Chicago  magazine  had 
also  published  from  the  Professor's  pen  an  elab 
orate  argument,  aiming  to  show  that  the  success 
ful  teaching  of  Negroes  "proves  absolutely  noth 
ing," — but  a  little  further  down  his  logical  page  he 
added,  "it  proves  conclusively"  that  the  superior 


88  The  Superior  Race 

genius  of  the  white  man  enables  him  to  teach  an 
"inferior"  anything  that  the  white  man  knows. 
The  article  consisted  almost  entirely  of  such  conclu 
sive  logic. 

But  now  the  Professor  is  hard  to  draw  into  these 
discussions,  and  is  generally  evasive  in  his  answers 
and  commonplace  in  his  statements.  He  has  been 
popular  ever  since  he  was  elected  to  his  professor 
ship  over  a  number  of  able  competitors, — some  of 
his  beaten  rivals  being  mean  enough  to  assert  that 
his  first  name  (Jefferson  Davis)  recommended  him 
to  the  trustees  more  than  did  his  scholarship. 
Whether  that  be  truth  or  slander,  it  is  known  that 
he  almost  always,  and  especially  when  appealing 
for  support  or  favor,  writes  his  full  name, — Jefferson 
Davis  Jones. 

But  to  the  cause  of  the  Professor's  lack  of  en 
thusiasm  now  when  the  Negro  is  being  discussed — 
a  dicussison  so  dear  and  interesting  to  a  Southern 
gathering  when  the  Negro  is  shut  out.  Last  sum 
mer  the  Profesor  by  sheer  accident  ran  head-on 
into  a  fact, — one  of  those  hard  rocks  of  experience 
against  which  the  ships  of  theory  have  ever  been 
and  will  ever  be  wrecked.  This  fact  was  a  real 
Negro,  a  six-foot  black  man  named  Nathan  Turner, 
employed  at  the  wharf  of  the  Munson  Steamship 
Line.  The  eminent  anthropologist  and  cognomi- 
nal  descendant  of  the  President  of  the  Confeder 
acy  had  never  seen  or  known  so  much  of  the  Negro 
race  in  all  the  four  decades  of  his  life  as  he  learned 


The  Superior  Race  89 

thru  contact  with  "the  Turner  nigger"  in  less  than 
four  days. 

Nathan  Turner  had  been  the  talk  of  the  "clubs" 
about  six  months  before ;  at  which  time  he  had 
been  given  the  remarkably  light  fine  of  twenty-five 
dollars  in  cash  and  thirty  days  on  the  chain  gang 
for  disarming  and  whipping  a  white  man  who  had 
drawn  a  gun  to  shoot  him,  and  the  white  man  had 
been  severely  reprimanded  by  the  court  for  allow 
ing  himseslf  to  be  drawn  into  a  fight  with  an  "in 
ferior  and  vicious  character"  instead  of  appealing 
to  the  officers  of  the  law :  for  a  policeman  who  was 
at  the  scene  of  trouble  as  an  onlooker  was  not  in 
vited  by  the  white  man  to  take  a  hand  in  the  affray 
until  the  "vicious  character"  had  disarmed  him  and 
thrown  him  to  the  ground,  when  the  vigilant  offi 
cer  at  the  call  of  the  vanquished  gentleman  rushed 
in,  used  his  mace  bloodily  on  the  Negro's  head 
and  hauled  him  off  to  the  lock-up.  This  "vicious" 
defence  made  by  the  Negro  together  with  the  light 
sentence  placed  upon  him  and  the  severe  reprimand 
imposed  upon  the  white  man,  almost  caused  the 
black  man  to  be  lynched  on  the  following  night. — 
But  a  recorder's  court  in  Mobile  is  no  fool,  and  like 
many  other  courts  in  similar  cases  the  recorder  did 
not  render  judgment  on  the  real  issue,  on  the  things 
that  were  seen  and  witnessed :  for  most  of  the  eye 
witnesses  were  on  Nathan  Turner's  side,  and  one 
of  them  was  his  white  employer,  Captain  Henry 
Sims.  .So  the  court  admitted  into  evidence  an  ob- 


90  The  Superior  Race 

scure  and  crumpled  piece  of  paper  on  which  some. 
"Nathan  Turner"  had  written  to  some  unknown 
person  that  there  was  a  certain  white  man  whom 
he  meant  to  whip  if  he  ever  bothered  him  again.  It 
was  asserted  by  the  lawyer  of  the  white  "com 
plainant"  (for  the  Negro  is  always  the  "defendant" 
in  such  a  case)  that  the  "said  Nathan  Turner"  was 
the  author  and  his  client  the  victim  of  this  threat. 
Finally  Turner  secured  the  privilege  of  writing  his 
own  name  for  the  inspection  of  the  court  to  show 
that  he  was  not  the  author  of  the  document  in 
question.  He  signed  habitually :  "Nat.  Turner." 
The  court,  who  had  been  reared  and  schooled  in  a 
certain  part  of  South  Carolina  where  the  famous 
insurrectionary  slave  is  still  execrated,  was  seen  to 
frown  like  a  storm,  then  redden  like  lightning  and 
literajly  thunder  out :  "Nigger,  is  your  name  'Nat 
Turner'?" — completely  ignoring  the  period.  The 
unsuspecting  black  man  replied :  "People  sometimes 
call  me  that,  and  I  sign  it  that  way  for  short." 
"Well,"  thundered  his  honor  again — and  the  light 
ning  struck,  "you're  guilty — twenty-five  dollars  and 
thirty  days !" 

What  is  in  a  name  ?  Is  man  fated  from  his  birth 
and  christening?  Just  as  Prof.  Jefferson  Davis 
Jones's  praenomina  had  been  suspected  to  be  among 
his  assets  in  life,  so  now  Nathan  Turner's  signa 
ture,  tho  absolutely  different  from  the  one  that  had 
been  ascribed  to  him,  proved  to  be  among  his  lia 
bilities.  Captain  Sims,  who  was  also  a  native 


The  Superior  Race  91 

Southerner  but  who  had  had  much  experience  with 
actual  instead  of  imaginary  Negroes,  was  literally 
white  \vith  anger  at  this  style  of  justice,  but  was 
impotent.  He  bestirred  himselsf,  however,  to  avert 
the  lynching  that  the  newspapers  predicted  for  that 
night ;  and  in  the  face  of  sharp  criticism  he  re- 
employed  Nathan  Turner  at  the  wharf  as  soon  as 
his  term  was  finished  on  the  chain  gang. 

The  anthropological  Professor  and  this  real  Ne 
gro,  two  men  of  historic  names,  were  destined  to 
share  together  an  intensely  human  experience, — 
where  Nature  herself  becomes  the  judge,  and  in 
which  names  are  really  of  no  account  and  the  fact 
of  individual  superiority  or  inferiority  rises  to  such 
prominence  as  to  entirely  obscure  all  considera 
tions  of  race  or  color. 

Captain  Sims,  a  fellow-clubman  of  the  Profes 
sor,  invited  him  to  go  on  a  few  days  (Outing, — 
camping,  fishing  and  shooting  near  the  end  of  Mo 
bile  Bay.  The  Captain  owned  some  land  on  an 
island  near  Fort  Gaines  and  had  a  gasoline  launch 
which  he  often  used  on  these  excursions.  On  an 
outing  of  several  days  he  always  took  his  trusted 
employee,  the  black  man  whom  he  had  befriended, 
Nathan  Turner. 

Turner  was  given  a  week's  vacation  and  hired 
to  accompany  the  two  white  men  on  a  two  or  three 
days'  excursion  around  outside  the  bay  where  the 
Captain  had  often  found  good  sport.  The  usual 
equipment  was  taken,  including  several  glass  jugs 


92  The  Superior  Race 

of  water  and  enough  food  for  two  or  three  days. 
The  weather  was  beautiful  and  the  waters  smooth, 
and  the  Captain  yielded  to  the  temptation  to  bear 
rather  far  out  and  enjoy  the  open  sea ;  and  they 
got  completely  out  of  call  and  almost  out  of  sight  of 
land.  Altho  Turner  was  busily  engaged  in  manipu 
lating  the  boat,  he  could  hear  some  of  the  conver 
sation  between  the  two  white  men.  Their  talk 
drifted  thru  various  subjects  into  politics,  and 
thence  straight  to  the  inevitable,  the  Race  Question. 
As  is  the  habit  in  the  South  they  frankly  expressed 
their  opinions  of  the  Negro  race  regardless  of  the 
ears  of  Turner  (for  he  gave  no  attention  whatever 
with  his  eyes),  as  if  they  did  not  consider  him  a 
part  of  the  thing  they  were  discussing. 

To  be  sure  the  Captain  disagreed  politely  with 
many  of  the  opinions  of  the  Professor,  and  stoutly 
asserted  that,  having  known  many  Negroes  per 
sonally,  he  believed  that  they  did  exactly  what 
white  people  would  do  if  on  the  same  plane  and 
in  the  same  circumstances.  And  with  the  charac 
teristic  concessions  and  apologies  of  a  white  man 
in  the  Captain's  position,  he  readily  explained  that 
he  by  no  means  thought  the  Negro  to  be  the  white 
man's  equal  and  did  not  believe  in  "social  equality," 
— but  that  he  thought  the  Negro,  even  tho  inferior, 
should  be  given  justice,  and  that  the  very  fact  of 
his  inferiority  should  make  it  easier  to  do  him  jus 
tice,  inasmuch  as  he  could  not  be  feared  as  a  rival. 
Then  like  a  plain  man  of  common  sense,  he  tried  to 


The  Superior  Race  93 

finish  the  argument  by  a  direct  parallel  with  the 
lower  animals,  and  glancing  at  Turner,  who  was 
all  ears  but  no  eyes,  he  continued:  "Now  take  the 
horse,— r\ve  are  really  not  afraid  of  horses,  there 
fore  we  do  not  make  laws  against  them  nor  allow 
them  to  be  lynched.  Why,  if  the  most  vicious  horse 
in  this  state  should  be  brought  out  into  the  public 
square,  chained  to  a  post  and  burned  alive,  this 
whole  damned  country  would  go  wild.  Somebody 
would  certainly  get  into  jail  and  be  ostracised  from 
good  society  if  not  sent  to  the  penitentiary, — and 
every  preacher  in  Alabama  would  rant  about  it  for 
months.  But  you  put  the  best  nigger  in  Mobile  in 
the  place  of  that  horse  and  most  people  in  this 
country  will  excuse  it  if  they  don't  defend  it." 

For  a  plain  mind  like  that  of  Sims  this  was  an 
unanswerable  argument,  but  not  so  for  the  anthro 
pological  mind.  The  Professor  belonged  to  that 
class  who  may  be  convinced  but  cannot  be  con 
verted.  He  was  like  the  politician  who  remarked 
that  he  had  heard  many  arguments  that  could  con 
vince  his  reason,  but  that  he  had  never  yet  heard 
one  that  could  influence  his  vote.  And  so  he  re 
plied  that  he  did  not  believe  in  "unnecessary"  kill 
ing  of  Negroes,  but  that  the  white  race's  "instincts 
of  self-preservation  and  sympathy  of  kind"  would 
naturally  lead  it  into  excesses  whenever  it  was 
threatened  to  be  "overwhelmed  and  submerged  by 
an  inferior  element."  And  without  deigning  to  ex 
plain  how  a  superior  ten  could  ever  be  "over- 


94  The  Superior  Race 

whelmed"  by  an  inferior  one,  he  went  on  to  say 
that  the  Negro  is  vicious  and  treacherous  and  is 
always  really  waiting  to  get  the  advantage  of  the 
white  race. — All  this  was  said  right  in  the  ears  of 
Turner,  as  if  he  were  indeed  a  lower  animal  and 
without  capacity  to  perceive  his  own  relation  to  the 
discussion. 

"Well,"  rejoined  the  Captain,  "I  don't  know  much 
about  theories  but  I  know  a  few  facts.  Take  the 
case  of  Nathan  Turner  here.  I  have  known  him 
nearly  all  his  life,  and  he  is  one  of  the  best  work 
men  in  every  sense  of  the  word  that  we  have  ever 
had ;  but  a  few  months  ago,  you  remember,  all  the 
papers  of  Mobile  called  him  a  desperado  and 
threatened  him  with  lynching.  And  he  would  have 
been  lynched  if  I  had  not  persuaded  the  sheriff 

He  was  interrupted  by  a  popping  followed  by  a 
sharp  explosion  from  the  gasoline  engine.  In  a 
moment  the  Captain  and  Turner  were  searching 
about  the  machine  to  see  what  'had  happened. 
"This  pipe  is  bu'sted  and  the  plug  blown  out,"  said 
Turner.  As  the  Captain  stooped  to  look  he  slipped 
and  caught  on  his  hand.  "What  in  the  hell  is  that?" 
he  exclaimed,  looking  at  his  gashed  and  bleeding 
hand,  "has  the  dern  thing  broken  all  the  water 
jugs?" — For  he  had  fallen  on  a  fragment  of  glass. 
— "No,"  answered  Turner,  "here  is  one  jug  not 
broken." 

After  a  brief  examination  of  the  damage  to  the 


The  Superior  Race  95 

machine,  it  was  seen  to  be  absolutely  beyond  their 
means  of  repair. 

"Nathan,  how  far  out  are  we?"  asked  Captain 
Sims. 

"About  a  half  dozen  miles,  I  think,"  replied  Tur 
ner. 

"Well,"  said  Sims  to  the  somewhat  startled  pro 
fessor,  "it  is  after  four  o'clock,  so  we  are  in  for  it." 

With  the  characteristic  confidence  of  the  human 
mind  they  expressed  the  opinion  that  some  vessel 
would  pass  in  hailing  distance  before  night  and 
pick  them  up  or  tow  them  in. — The  explosion  evi 
dently  broke  the  Professor's  chain  of  logic,  for  he 
was  less  talkative ;  or  perhaps  he  was  remembering 
the  time  when  he  had  heard  of  this  Turner  Negro 
before  and  of  his  daring  to  whip  a  white  man, — 
and  how  he  himself  at  the  University  Club  had 
been  inspired  by  the  incident  to  discourse  anthro 
pologically  on  the  Negro  race  and  to  denounce 
Turner  as  "one  of  those  vicious  brutes  who  ought 
not  to  be  at  large."  At  any  rate  the  suspicion  arose 
in  his  mind  that  perhaps  this  Negro  out  of  resent 
ment  to  what  he  had  overheard  caused  the  mach 
inery  to  break  on  purpose,  and  he  hinted  that  sus 
picion  to  Sims.  But  the  Captain  who  in  his  present 
predicament  was  not  so  patient  with  anthropology 
as  he  had  been,  gave  him  an  emphatic  "No"  and 
added  almost  curtly  that  he  would  trust  Nathan  as 
far  as  he  would  any  white  man  of  his  acquaintance. 

At  six  in  the  evening  they  ate  lunch  and  drank 


96  The  Superior  Race 

water,  still  expecting  succor.  Consistent  with  the 
customs  of  their  civilization  the  Negro  was  doled 
out  a  portion  after  the  white  men  had  entirely  fin 
ished. 

After  lunch  they  all  waited  in  silence,  as  if  each 
hesitated  to  confess  to  the  others  his  waning  hope 
for  being  picked  up  that  night.  Turner  broke  the 
silence  between  seven  and  eight  by  calling  atten 
tion  to  a  rising  cloud  in  the  northwest  and  the  stiff 
ening  breeze.  He  suggested  that  they  unroll  the 
tarpaulin  and  fasten  it  over  the  boat  as  a  precau 
tion  against  rain  and  perhaps  spray.  Hardly  had 
they  done  this  when  half  of  the  sky  was  covered 
with  cloud  and  the  wind  was  causing  small  white- 
caps  on  the  waves.  It  was  evident  that  they  were 
being  blown  further  and  further  out  to  sea.  The 
sky  grew  darker,  the  wind  blew  harder.  They 
were,  of  course,  helpless  as  to  whither  they  were 
drifting,  but  Turner  took  the  rudder  and  "trimmed" 
the  boat  as  best  he  could  to  keep  it  from  capsizing 
and  to  keep  the  water  out,  meanwhile  issuing  or 
ders  to  his  comrades  in  danger  as  if  he  had  become 
their  commander  by  appointment  of  Nature.  These 
orders  were  implicitly  obeyed  and  instructions  even 
asked  for  by  the  other  two  men.  Perhaps  the 
Professor  consoled  himself  with  the  useful  logic 
that  there  is  no  use  in  standing  upon  technicalities 
since  all  men  are  the  same  color  in  the  dark. 

After  being  driven  and  beaten  about  all  night 
in  terror  of  their  lives,  soaked  with  sea  water,  thev 


The  Superior  Race  97 

met  in  the  morning  a  dead  calm  almost  as  suddenly 
as  they  had  encountered  the  storm  on  the  evening 
before.  The  Professor  looked  ten  years  older  than 
yesterday,  with  his  bedraggled  longish  hair  and 
clean-shaven  sallow  face.  "I  wonder  where  in  the 
world  we  are,"  he  ejaculated. 

"We  must  be  somewhere  in  the  middle  of  the 
Gulf,  judging  by  the  rate  at  which  we  were  blown 
along/'  said  Captain  Sims,  feigning  courage  by  his 
exaggeration.  "I  suppose  we  need  food  after  such 
a  hard  fight,  but  we  must  be  careful  with  bread  and 
water,  for  we  may  need  what  we  have  for  several 
days  yet."  So  saying  he  arranged  three  small 
lunches,  and  as  if  the  wind  had  really  blown  them 
far  enough  from  the  center  of  their  peculiar  civili 
zation  to  allow  them  immunity  from  its  stern  man 
dates  and  iron  customs,  he  said :  "Come  on,  Nathan, 
let's  all  eat. — I  don't  know  what  would  have  hap 
pened  without  Nathan ;  his  head  is  as  cool  as  the 
wind." 

The  dead  calm  continued;  the  sky  became  clear 
and  the  day  warm.  All  day  and  all  night  and  until 
the  middle  of  the  next  day  they  waited,  but  nothing 
human  was  seen  above  their  horizon  outside  the 
bounds  of  their  little  boat.  The  sea  was  almost 
like  glass  for  smoothness  and  the  sky  was  hot  and 
hazy.  There  was  not  much  food ;  some  of  it  got  wet 
and  spoiled;  and  the  water  was  getting  low  in  the 
jug,  tho  they  partook  of  it  very  sparingly.  They 
had  planned  so  that  one  of  them  was  awake  all  the 


98  The  Superior  Race 

time  on  the  lookout  for  succor,  and  Nathan  Turner 
did  most  of  the  Captain's  watching,  for  the  latter 
was  rather  sick  and  suspected  ptomaine  poisoning. 

On  the  afternoon  of  this  second  day  following 
the  storm  the  Negro  several  times  noticed  the  two 
white  men  in  secret  and  earnest  conversation  in 
which  the  Professor  seemed  to  be  the  aggressor  and 
the  Captain  the  objector.  The  quick  instinct  of 
the  Negro  led  him  to  suspect  that  this  conversation 
in  some  way  related  to  him, — for  what  other 
secret  could  interest  two  white  men  in  the  present 
situation?  At  one  time  when  they  had  their  heads 
together  he  noticed  them  direct  their  eyes  and  evi 
dently  their  conversation  to  the  small  quantity  of 
water  in  the  jug.  Later  in  the  afternoon  he  saw 
the  Captain  frown  -and  say  to  the  importunate 
Professor  something  of  which  Turner  could  catch 
only  the  last  words, — "saved  us  already  and  may 
be  our  dependence  yet."  Turner  was  not  certain 
whether  these  words  referred  to  him  or  to  the 
water, — but  in  either  case  he  concluded  that  the 
scarcity  of  food  and  water  was  the  cause  of  the 
anxiety,  and  that  inasmuch  as  the  conversation  was 
secreted  from  him  it  must  be  his  share  in  these 
necessaries  that  was  under  debate.  White  people 
usually  discuss  the  Negro's  share  with  the  Negro 
absent. 

So  far  his  reasoning  was  correct,  but  it  might 
have  alarmed  him  had  he  guessed  what  stern  meas 
ure  the  Professor  was  urging  the  Captain  to  em- 


The  Superior  Race  99 

ploy  in  order  to  secure  the  Negro's  share  of  bread 
and  water  for  themselves,  in  the  hope  that  even  a 
day  or  an  hour  more  of  life  might  cause  the  two 
of  them  to  be  saved.  He  noticed,  however,  that 
the  guns  and  hunting  knives  were  kept  close  under 
the  white  men's  eyes  when  not  under  their  very 
hands.  Turner  had  always  trusted  the  Captain, 
but  there  gradually  arose  in  his  mind  the  suspicion, 
which  is  pretty  general  among  the  members  of  his 
race,  that  in  a  case  like  this  the  best  white  man 
cannot  be  expected  to  do  justice  to  a  black  man. 
Besides,  Sims  was  growing  sicker  and  weaker  until 
by  night  he  was  quite  helpless.  Turner  made  him 
a  "pallet"  by  spreading  a  blanket  in  the  rear  of  the 
boat  and  folding  the  sick  man's  coat  for  a  pillow. 

Now  for  the  night  Turner  and  the  Professor, 
whom  he  thoroly  distrusted  by  this  time,  must 
take  turns  in  the  watching.  What  should  he  do 
when  his  turn  came  to  sleep? — He  decided  upon  a 
simple  ruse :  to  feign  sleep  in  his  turn  and  watch 
the  Professor's  movements.  So,  taking  the  first 
watch  and  keeping  it  till  nearly  midnight  he  noticed 
that  the  Professor  did  not  sleep  or  slept  very  light 
ly,  for  he  stired  whenever  Turner  made  any  un 
usual  movement.  As  is  the  rule,  this  suspicion  by 
the  white  man  made  the  Negro  more  suspicious  of 
the  white  man. 

In  these  two  human  bosoms  a  desperation  was 
growing.  .Tho  their  tongues  were  silent  as  the 
tomb,  their  spirits  communed  together  in  bitter- 


100  The  Superior  Race 

ness.  Each  suspected  that  the  other  understood 
him :  and  tho  no  threatening  word  had  been  ut 
tered  nor  hostile  hand  raised  they  were  already 
engaged  in  a  spiritual  death-struggle. 

At  last  Turner  said  unconcernedly :  "I'll  rest  now. 
if  you'll  watch." 

"All  right,"  said  the  anthropologist,  with  a  sigh, 
as  if  he  had  been  holding  his  breath. 

Turner  sat  leaning  back  against  the  front  of  the 
boat  and  became  quiet;  his  heart  beat  jerkily  and 
his  muscles  tightened  as  he  observed  the  other  man 
move  stealthily  toward  the  rear  where  lay  two 
dangerous  incentives, — food  and  weapons.  But 
feigning  sleep  brought  no  decisive  result.  Finally 
he  became  half  unconscious  with  weariness  and 
watching,  when  a  slight  tremor  of  the  boat  waked 
him.  He  threw  up  his  hands  and  thrust  some 
thing  hard  from  before  his  face  just  as  there  was 
the  "crack"  of  a  38-calibre  rifle.  He  uttered  an 
involuntary  shriek  of  surprise,  but  only  his  left 
thumb  which  had  caught  the  gun  on  the  end,  had 
been  grazed  and  burnt  by  the  discharge. 

The  sick  man,  startled  into  sudden  strength  by 
the  report  of  the  gun,  shouted :  "You  damned  fool ! 
I  told  you  not  to  kill  him.  The  water  would  have 
lasted  a  day  or  two  longer  and  he  might  have  saved 
our  lives." 

But  just  then  the  sick  man's  eyes  fell  upon  the 
most  savage  crisis  in  the  animal  world, — a  hand-to- 
hand,  man-to-man  struggle.  The  two  figures  in 


The  Superior  Race  101 

the  front  of  the  boat  with  the  weapon  lifted  high 
between  them  were  writhing  and  twisting  like  sil 
houettes  in  a  cinematograph.  Foiled  in  his  at 
tempt,  the  Professor  was  now  engaged  in  what  he 
thought  to  be  a  death-struggle.  No  anthropological 
idea,  if  indeed  one  could  have  found  lodgment  in  his 
tumultuous  mind,  could  now  bow  his  antagonist. 
Kipling  has  suggested  that  there  is  neither  kith 
nor  kin  nor  race  nor  breed  nor  birth,  when  two 
strong  men  stand  face  to  face,  "the  they  come 
from  the  ends  of  the  earth." — Finally  one  of  the 
strugglers  gave  way  with  a  despairing  groan  and 
the  other  tumbled  forward  upon  him.  The  sick 
man  was  so  exhausted  with  excitement  that  he 
could  not  even  speak.  "You  sly  coward!"  shouted 
the  voice  of  Nathan  Turner.  "If  I  were  low-down 
like  you  now  I'd  throw  you  into  the  Gulf." 

By  right  of  conquest  the  Negro  was  now  the 
master.  "Don't  be  worried,  Cap'n  Sims,"  said  he 
coldly.  "I'll  look  after  the  Pr'fess'r."  He  then 
ordered  the  Professor  to  remain  where  he  was, 
while  he  proceeded  to  throw  overboard  all  the 
weapons  except  a  sheathed  hunting  knife  which  he 
put  on  his  own  person.  Then  saying,  "I'm  sorry, 
Mister,  but  I  want  to  keep  you  out  of  trouble  and 
I  want  to  stay  out  of  trouble  myself,"  he  securely 
tied  the  Professor's  hands  behind  his  back  and  left 
him  on  watch  while  he  himself  went  to  rest. 

The  Negro  secretly  admired  what  he  called  in 
his  mind  the  "gameness"  of  the  white  man  in  that 


102  The  Superior  Race 

he  did  not  waste  words  in  protest  or  make  futile 
resistance  after  he  found  himself  completely 
worsted. 

As  day  broke  the  Captain  said  that  he  was  feel 
ing  better  and  asked  for  a  little  water.  Turner 
gave  him  a  drink  and  then  asked  the  silent  Pro 
fessor  in  a  searching,  conciliatory  voice  if  he  did 
not  want  a  drink  also.  He  replied  coldly  that  he 
would  like  to  have  a  drink,  "if  you  are  willing  to 
give  me  any."  Paying  no  attention  to  the  con 
ditional  clause,  Turner  poured  out  some  water,  and 
as  he  was  about  to  raise  the  cup  to  the  other  man's 
mouth,  he  stopped  and  said:  "Now,  there  ain't  a 
bit  of  use  in  this  sort  of  foolishness.  We  are  ali 
in  the  same  boat.  We  may  go  to  the  bottom  and 
we  may  be  saved,  but  we  can  all  be  fair  to  one 
another.  I  can  forget  all  about  our  little  difference 
last  night  if  you  can." 

The  white  man  hesitated  for  a  minute  as  if 
searching1  for  an  expedient  in  an  embarrassing 
situation,  and  then  said :  "I  will  be  willing  to  do 
whatever  you  and  Captain  Sims  think  best." 

"All  right,"  said  Turner,  ignoring  the  irrelevant 
part  of  the  reply,  and  untying  the  prisoner,  "I 
think  it  best  for  us  all  to  go  along  together,  and 
I  think  we  are  going  to  be  picked  up  before  to 
morrow  night," 

Captain  Sims,  who  had  tactfully  taken  no  notice 
of  these  proceedings,  remarked  that  he  believed  he 
discerned  smoke  to  the  southward.  The  others 


The  Superior  Race  103 

strained  their  eyes  but  were  not  certain  of  any 
smoke.  But  an  hour  later  they  saw  a  small  steam 
er  to  the  southwest  of  them,  evidently  headed 
northwest.  Immediately  Turner  sprang  on  the 
bow  of  the  launch  and  waved  his  hat  and  shouted 
with  all  his  might.  They  all  shouted  and  waved 
frantically,  but  seemingly  in  vain,  for  no  heed  was 
taken  of  them.  Finally  Turner  literally  tore  off  his 
shirt  which  he  tied  to  a  fishing  rod ;  this  he  handed 
to  the  Professor,  and  lifting  him  into  the  air  told 
him  to  wave  it.  A  few  minutes  of  this  strenuous 
exercise  caused  a  puff  of  steam  to  fly  up  from 
the  ship,  and  a  moment  later  the  hoarse  whistling 
reached  them.  She  changed  her  course,  a  boat 
and  crew  were  lowered  and  the  rescued  men  were 
taken  aboard  with  their  launch. — It  was  a  Cuban 
crew,  and  Captain  Sims  knew  enough  Spanish  to 
learn  that  they  were  going  from  Havana  to  New 
Orleans, 

Four  days  later  there  appeared  in  the  Mobile 
Evening  News  an  account  of  the  harrowing  experi 
ence  of  two  prominent  white  citizens  and  a  Negro 
wharf  employee  named  Nathan  Turner.  The  Ne 
gro  was  the  only  one  mentioned  by  name,  and  great 
stress  was  laid  on  his  "exceptional"  courage  and  his 
commendable  "faithfulness"  to  the  two  white  men. 

Captain  Sims  chuckled  as  he  showed  this  "peace 
offering"  to  Nathan  Turner,  who  laughed  and 
opened  his  white  eyes,  making  his  inky-black  face 
look  even  blacker,  when  he  saw  himself  described 


104  The  Superior  Race 

as  a  "dark  mulatto,"— for  they  both  knew  that  the 
contributing  editor  of  the  News  was  Professor 
Jefferson  Davis  Jones. 


"PASSING  THE  BUCK" 

The  North  and  the  South  met  together  at  the 
great  Methodist  Centenary  Exposition  in  Columbus 
Ohio.  An  unusual  practice  of  democracy  was  pre 
valent  there,  when  we  consider  that  fact.  All  the 
races  of  mankind  mingled  freely  in  the  various  pri 
vileges  of  the  exposition.  The  reactionaries  were 
there,  however,  and  they  only  tolerated  this  de 
mocracy;  they  did  not  indorse  it. 

Among  these  was  a  group  of  four  persons  from 
a  moderate-sized  North  Carolina  town,  who  had 
been  "suckled  on  a  'creed  outworn," — 'the  creed  of 
inherent  racial  superiority.  One  was  the  mother, 
proud  in  her  graying  light  hair,  consistent  daugh 
ter  of  a  former  slave-holding  aristocracy.  There 
was  the  daughter  of  this  matron,  a  real  Southern 
belle,  with  light  hair  slightly  fluffy  rather  than 
curly,  twenty  years  old,  aquiline,  lithe,  well-shaped, 
-with  small  feet  'and  lean  ankles.  There  was 
the  son  and  brother,  twenty-six  years  old,  smell 
ing-  of  cigarettes,  brusque  in  manner,  drawling  in 
speech,  and  swearing  easily.  The  fourth  was  a 
nephew  and  cousin,  who  was  jborn  and  re-ared 
in  Ohio,  from  Abolitionist  stock  on  his  father's 
side,  but  who  had  now  been  living  in  the  South 


106  Passing  The  Buck 

with  his  cousins  just  long  enough  to  become  "con 
verted"  and  subverted  on  the  race  question.  He 
had  learned  to  "hate  niggers"  as  only  a  Southern- 
ized  Northerner  can.  It  had  taken  him  just  thir 
teen  months  to  learn  that  the  North  was  "all 
wrong"  on  the  Negro  and  the  South.  Thirteen 
months  of  contact  in  the  South  had  undone  thirty- 
odd  years  of  training  in  Christian  democracy  in  his 
father's  house  and  at  Oberlin  College. 

This  "converted"  Northerner  was  becoming^ 
very  popular  in  that  North  Carolina  community. 
His  street-corner  confessions  of  a  change  of 
heart,  and  his  ready  ridicule  of  the  sentimentality 
of  his  Northern  home  folk  had  advertised  him  as 
a  "sensible  Yankee."  If  he  would  make  his  home 
in  North  Carolina,  local  people  told  him,  he  could 
get  to  Congress  on  the  Democratic  ticket  and 
"help  to  open  the  eyes  of  the  North." 

It  was  especially  urged  by  the  leaders  of  the 
Southern  church  that  this  converted  man  should 
go  to  the  Centenary  Celebration  in  Columbus, 
where  they  would  arrange  for  him  to  appear  a- 
mong  the  speakers  and  begin  at  once  his  mission, 
of  enlightening  those  benighted  people  still  left 
in  isolated  places  of  the  North  who  believe  that 
"niggers"  are  human  beings. 

At  the  exposition  grounds  this  party  of  four 
had  got  acquainted  with  'another  man  from  Ohio, 
who  was  much  attracted  by  the  physical  beauty 
and  vivacity  of  the  Southern  belle.  This  Ohioan 


Passing  The  Buck  107 

"was  a  faithful  churchman,  with  his  business  in 
Cincinnati  and  his  home  in  one  of  the  smaller 
towns  between  that  city  and  Columbus.  He  en 
joyed  the  company  of  the  Southern  party,  dined 
with  them,  and  together  they  visited  the  various 
exhibits  during  the  last  two  weeks  of  the  exposi 
tion.  After  they  had  passed  through  the  exhibit 
section  called  "THE  AMERICAN  NEGRO,"  he 
was  amused  at  their  views  concerning  the  colored 
race,  which  they  continued  to  force  into  the 
conversations,  in  spite  of  his  efforts  to  change 
the  subject.  Many  Southern  white  people  'feel 
It  like  a  patriotic  duty  to  make  converts  on  this 
subject. 

Finally  one  day  as  they  sat  by  "the  lake"  un 
der  the  trees  at  the  exposition  grounds  the  dis 
cussion  was  waxing  hot  on  the  topic  as  to 
whether  any  Negro,  however  intelligent  and 
seemingly  refined,  should  ever  be  regarded  and 
treated  as  a  gentleman  |by  (white  people.  The 
simple-minded  and  unsophisticated  Northerner 
ventured  to  offer  evidence  of  this  kind:  "Why, 
I  know  one,  have  known  him  for  ten  years.  He 
is  an  assistant  clerk  in  our  Cincinnati  office.  He 
•was  a  southern  boy,  who  graduated  with  hon 
ors  at  Yale  and  has  made  good.  He  is  a  real 
g-entleraan.  I  saw  'him  today,  I  will  introduce 
him  to  you  just  to  let  you  see  for  yourselves." 

The  way  in  which  the  quartet  greeted  this 
last  suggestion  of  his  made  this  well-meaning 


108  Passing  The  Buck 

man  feel  silly  and  sick.  The  belle  laughed  at 
him  openly  as  if  he  were  a  fool.  Her  brothef 
swore  mutteringly.  The  "converted"  cousin 
hissed  and  sneered.  And  the  mother,  with  all 
the  conscious  pride  tof  three  hundred  /years  (of 
active  "race  superiority,"  threw  back  her  head 
and  said:  "  Why  we  have  in  our  own  state 
hundreds  of  niggers  who  are  just  as  intelligent 
as  the  one  you  speak  of,  but  they  are  niggers  just 
the  same, — and  nobody  ever  presumed  to  'intro 
duce'  them  to  us !" 

The  simple-hearted  offender  somewhat  confused, 
said  hurriedly:  "I  do  not  mean  to  encroach  upon 
your  private  rights, — but  he  is  a  friend  of  mine.** 
At  this  the  women  smiled,  the  brother  guffawed, 
and  the  "converted"  one  remarked :  "You  need  to 
come  South, — that's  what  you  need." 

"One  nigger  had  the  nerve,"  said  the  brother, 
"to  sit  right  down  at  our  table  when  we  were  eat 
ing  in  the  cafeteria." — "And  then,"  said  the  mother, 
"'he  also  had  the  nerve  to  come  over  to  the  Colis 
eum  and  take  a  seat  right  in  front  of  me!" 

"That's  not  all,"  remarked  the  "converted" 
cousin,  "but  I  remembered  that  darkey's  face, 
and  he  is  the  same  fellow  that  heckled  me  when 
I  spoke  at  the  Big  Tent  this  afternoon." 

What  really  happened  in  the  Big  Tent  was  this: 
About  three  thousand  Celebration  visitors  had  gath 
ered  there  to  hear  a  speech  announced  as :  "The 
Confessions  of  an  Ohioan  from  North  Carolina/* 


Passing  The  Buck  109 

Black  and  white,  North  and  South,  gathered  to 
hear  these  "confessions."  In  justice  to  the  ma 
jority  of  those  in  charge  of  the  Celebration,  it 
should  be  said  that  this  speech  would  never  have 
been  allowed,  had  its  real  nature  been  anticipated. 
The  "converted"  Northerner  made  the  worst  anti- 
Negro  speech  that  had  been  uttered  since  Wilson 
muzzled  Vardaman  and  the  Lord  muzzled  Tillman. 
He  said  that  Negroes  should  not  vote,  that  "blood 
would  run"  (especially  in  North  Carolina)  before 
they  would  submit  to  the  official  rule  of  any  Negro, 
that  the  Negro  was  only  after  '"social  equality," 
etc.  To  prove  the  last  statement  he  instanced  that 
a  few  Negro  babies  had  been  left  in  France  by 
colored  American  soldiers !  At  this  point  the  col 
ored  man's  voice  called  out  from  the  rear  of  the 
tent :  "And  how  do  you  explain  the  millions  of 
mulattoes  in  the  South?"  The  blow  temporarily 
stunned  the  speaker,  and  as  he  recovered  he  re 
plied  :  "Er — ah — er  I'm  coming  to  that  later."  He 
never  came  to  it. 

The  speaker  did  not  seem  to  realize  that  in 
France  there  was  no  social  barrier, — and  that  there 
•is  a  barrier  in  the  South,  set  by  white  men  them 
selves  ;  and  that  therefore  the  association  of  black 
men  with  white  women  in  France,  where  there  is 
no  barrier,  was  virtue,  as  compared  with  the  vici- 
ousness  of  the  American  white  man  who  breaks 
through  the  very  barrier  which  he  has  hypocritically 
set  up  to  preserve  his  own  "racial  integrity."  There 


110  Passing  The  Buck 

are  many  people  who  have  not  considered  that  dif 
ference. 

At  the  close  of  the  Celebration  this  party  of  four 
decided  to  visit  Cincinnati  on  their  way  back  to  the 
South.  The  Northern  acquaintance  had  seen  them 
to  the  station  and  into  the  Cincinnati  sleeper,  and 
as  the  train  did  not  leave  till  after  midnight,  he 
had  promised,  if  possible,  to  get  a  ticket  for  that 
same  train,  or  else  to  come  next  day  and  show 
them  about  Cincinnati.  He  had  some  business  en 
gagement  in  Columbus  which  he  could  not  be  sure 
of  getting  rid  of  that  evening. 

As  he  was  leaving  the  gate  at  the  Union  Sta 
tion,  he  met  his  colored  friend  going  in  to  take 
the  train  for  Cincinnati.  "If  you  had  got  here  a 
little  earlier  I  could  have  introduced  you  to  those 
Southern  friends  of  mine,  who,  I  told  you,  are  so 
anxious  to  meet  you."  Both  laughed. 

"Let  me  see  your  ticket,"  continued  the  white 
friend.  "By  the  way,  you  are  in  their  car.  Too 
bad  you  have  not  had  an  introduction.  I  must 
hurry  now  and  try  to  take  that  car  myself." 

Meanwhile  the  Southern  party  had  found  its 
berths.  The  mother  had  lower  seven,  the  daughter 
lower  eight  opposite,  and  the  men  had  nine  and 
ten.  When  the  colored  man  entered  the  car,  the 
daughter  had  put  her  coat  and  bag  on  the  seat  at 
section  eight,  but  was  herself  sitting  in  nine  talk 
ing  to  the  two  men. 

There  is  humor  in  fate.    This  colored  man  walk- 


Passing  The  Buck  111 

ed  straight  to  number  eight  and  deposited  his  be 
longings  and  took  his  seat.  He  had  the  upper. 
When  the  two  men  saw  him,  they  were  like  bulls 
when  they  see  a  red  rag.  There  was  brief  con 
sternation  and  then  some  half  audible  "damns" 
only  indirectly  aimed  at  the  colored  passenger,  and 
to  which  he  paid  no  seeming  attention  whatever. 
He  continued  to  read  a  newspaper.  He  rather  felt 
than  saw  them  as  they  ostentatiously  came  over  and 
removed  the  girl's  belongings  to  one  of  the  men's 
berths  and  brought  a  man's  coat  and  bag  and  flung 
them  defiantly  into  number  eight.  In  order  to 
strengthen  his  wilful  indifference  by  action,  the 
colored  man  got  up  and  moved  off  unconcernedly 
to^the  smoking  room.  As  he  went  he  overheard 

one  say:  "that  same  old  nigger  ."     He  began 

to  recollect,  and  the  cafeteria  and  the  Big  Tent 
came  up  in  his  mind. 

When  he  returned  from  the  smoking  room  later, 
he  found  the  girl's  belongings  back  in  number 
eight,  and  she  and  the  two  men  were  chatting 
merrily  and  normally  in  a  nearby  seat,  as  if 
nothing  had  ever  happened.  This  made  him  suspi 
cious.  It  is  strange  that  normal  conduct,  coming 
as  a  quick  successor  to  abnormal  conduct,  will  in 
variably  make  us  suspect.  He  began  to  think,  and 
later  he  moved  off  again  to  the  smoking  room  and 
thought  and  thought  some  more. 

After  a  while  the  porter  came  into  the  smoking 


112  Passing  The  Buck 

room  and  said:  "All  berths  have  been  made  down, 
sir,  when  you  are  ready  to  retire." 

"Wait  here  a  minute,  porter,"  said  the  colored 
man,  "I  have  something  to  say  to  you."  He  first 
stepped  out  and  peeped  in  at  the  berths.  What 
he  saw  confirmed  his  suspicions.  The  cousin  and 
brother  were  in  earnest  conversation  with  the 
Southern  girl.  She  appeared  to  be  objecting  in 
stinctively,  but  they  seemed  to  be  urging  it,  almost 
compelling  her.  An  agreement  seemed  to  be  reach 
ed,  the  girl  yielding  very  reluctantly,  and  each 
turned  to  his  own  berth,  she  going  to  number  eigfht. 

The  colored  passenger  went  back  to  the  smok 
ing  room :  "Porter,  here's  a  dollar.  I  want  you  to 
do  something  for  me, — very  little  trouble  to  you. 
And  I  will  explain  before  we  reach  Cincinnati. 
Tell  the  conductor  that  I  am  an  old  friend  of  yours ; 
that  I  want  to  sit  up  here  with  you  and  talk  over 
old  times ;  and  that  he  need  not  refund  my  money 
for  upper  eight  unless  some  other  passenger  takes 
it.  But  listen,  porter,  don't  you  let  any  colored 
person  get  into  it.  I'll  claim  it  myself  first.  Put 
some  white  man  into  it,  especially  if  a  tall  young 
fellow  in  a  Palm  Beach  suit  asks  for  accommoda 
tions  to  Cincinnati." 

The  porter  stared  a  bit,  seemingly  mystified,  but 
finally  shrugged  his  shoulders  and  said:  "I'll  fix 
that  all  right." 

Later  the  porter  was  heard  to  say  to  some  one 
on  the  platform :  "No,  sir,  all  space  is  taken.  You 


Passing  The  Buck  113 

might  try  the  St.  Louis  car."  Later,  still,  to  some 
other  applicant :  "Yessir,  yessirree,  jes'  one  upper 
left,  sir.  You  goin'  to  Cincinnati?"  The  porter's 
voice  seemed  to  be  intentionally  loud.  The  col 
ored  passenger  slipped  into  the  toilet  room.  He 
heard  the  new  arrival  come  into  the  smoking  room, 
wash  his  hands  and  go  off  with  the  porter  to  climb 
into  his  berth.  The  porter  returned. 

"Was  it  he,  porter?" 

uYes,  it's   him.     Gone   to  upper   eight." 

"Anybody  see  him?" 

"No.     The  lights  are  out  and  all  seem  sleep." 

Soon  the  Pullman  conductor  came  in,  looked  at 
his  watch,  yawned  and  remarked  to  the  colored 
passenger :  "Porter  seems  glad  to  see  one  of  his 
old  friends ;  it's  been  a  long  dry  spell  in  Ohio," — • 
and  then  he  chuckled  at  his  own  wit. 

After  he  and  the  colored  passenger  and  the  por 
ter  had  talked  about  a  number  of  things  and  the 
train  was  on  its  way,  a  slight  commotion  was 
heard  in  the  berth  sections,  with  confused 
voices.  The  colored  passenger  covertly  touched 
the  porter's  arm  and  kept  him  back  while  the  Pull 
man  conductor  went  to  investigate.  When  the 
conductor  went  in,  the  excited  voices  became  loud 
er:  "If  you  don't  have  him  arrested,  conductor, 
and  put  off  this  train,  we'll  fix  him.  He  ought  to 
be  in  North  Carolina — that's  what  I  say  about  let- 
tin'  niggers  into  Pullman  cars — we  know  'em  in 


114  '  Passing  The  Buck 

the  south  all  right ,"  the  two  men  seemed  to 

be  awfully  wrought  up. 

Meanwhile  the  colored  passenger,  in  the  smok 
ing  room,  had  given  the  porter  some  hurried  ex 
planations.  The  porter  turned  on  the  lights  and 
they  two  went  and  peeped  in.  Three  persons  were 
in  the  aisle  remonstrating  with  the  conductor,  two 
men  and  a  woman,  they  in  their  trousers,  and  she 
in  her  kimono,  looking  really  and  truly  excited. 

"Come  here,  porter,"  shouted  the  conductor. 
Then  to  the  two  men :  "Well,  we  won't  have  any 
personal  violence  done  in  this  car.  So  you  just 
put  up  that  gun  and  we'll  get  the  train  conductor 
and  investigate." 

"Investigate  hell!  you'll  put  that  nigger  out  o* 
here  or  we  will !" 

Meanwhile  the  porter  had  gone  for  the  train 
conductor.  The  colored  passenger  was  peeping  in, 
still  unobserved.  When  the  train  conductor  came, 
the  Pullman  conductor  hastily  explained,  conclud 
ing:  " and  they  charge  that  the  passenger  in 

the  upper  annoyed  her." 

"He  started  into  her  berth,"  said  the  brother. 

"Wait !"  said  the  conductor,  and  he  shook  the 
mattress  of  upper  eight. 

"He's  not  asleep,"  sneered  one  of  the  Southern 
ers. 

The  conductor  shook  again,  and  a  truly  sleepy 
voice  said:  "Is  it  time  to  get  up?" 

"The  hell  it  is!"  snarled  the  brother. 


Passing,  The  Buck  115 

"Wake  up,"  said  the  conductor,  "you  are  charged 
with  trying  to  enter  the  berth  of  the  lady  in  lower 
eight" 

"Well,"  said  the  voice  now  fully  awake,  "I'm  a 
church  member,  but  whoever  made  that  charge  is 
a  damned  liar!"  And  with  that  a  tousled  red 
head  shot  out  from  between  the  green  curtains. 

The  girl  fainted. 

The  brother  said:  "There  must  be  some  mis 
take." 

The  red  head  rubbed  its  eyes  and  said:  "What 
in  God's  name?" 

"Where's  the  nigger?"  asked  the  cousin.  "It 
was  a  nigger,  she  meant." 

Heads  were  sticking  out  from  several  berths  by 
this  time  and  at  this  juncture  our  colored  passen 
ger  walked  in  from  the  smoking  room. 

"There  he  is,"  said  the  brother. 

"He?"  said  the  Pullman  conductor,  "I  left  him 
in  the  smoking  room  with  the  porter  when  I  heard 
the  racket  and  came  in  here,  and  he  had  been  there 
talking  to  me  and  the  porter  ever  since  the  train 
started." 

The  colored  passenger  looked  on  scornfully,. with 
his  lips  tight. 

"Well!"  shouted  the  disgusted  train  conductor, 
"this  passenger  in  upper  eight — has  he  done  any 
thing?" 

"No !"  yelled  the  "converted"  one,  in  great  humil 
iation  and  anger. 


116  Passing  The  Buck 

The  conductor  wheeled  and  left.  The  mother 
accompanied  her  reviving  daughter  to  the  wom 
en's  room. 

"She'll  explain,"  said  the  profane  brother  in  an 
embarrassed  voice  to  the  head  in  upper  eight. 

By  this  time,  however,  the  man  in  the  upper 
and  the  colored  passenger  had  caught  each  other's 
eye,  and  the  latter  was  remarking :  "/  will  explain 
to  you  tomorrow  at  the  office." 

The  next  afternoon  at  the  office  in  Cincinnati, 
after  they  had  expressed  their  mutual  disgust  at 
the  experiences  of  the  night  before,  the  colored 
assistant  clerk  remarked  to  his  friend :  "I  saw  that 
a  rather  intimate  relationship  was  going  to  de 
velop,  and  knowing  that  you  were  an  acquaintance 
of  theirs,  and  not  having  yet  had  the  honor  of  an 
introduction  myself,  I  decided  to  pass  the  buck  to 
you!" 


TIT  FOR  TAT 

How  Colored  Soldiers  Defeated  the  Real  Enemy 
at  Grand  Villars 

This  is  one  of  the  true  stories  of  the  war.  And 
true  stories  are  really  the  more  fascinating. 

The  colored  soldiers  in  this  case  were  the  370th 
regiment,  largely  from  Chicago  and  the  South,  and 
the  "real  enemy"  was  a  white  American  regiment 
that  was  full  of  Negro-haters. 

The  people  of  the  little  French  town  of  Grand 
Villars  are  of  the  simple-living,  noble-minded  peas 
ant  class,  with  high  ideals  of  human  life  and  free 
from  many  of  the  petty  motives  that  spoil  much 
of  the  rest  of  the  world.  They  had  never  seen 
Americans,  and  it  happened  that  the  first  Ameri 
can  soldiers  stationed  among  them  were  colored, 
the  370th.  This  regiment  was  such  a  good  sample 
of  its  own  colored  people  in  America,  running  thru 
all  the  possible  colors  from  white  Negroes  to  black. 
And  yet  they  were  of  one  heart  and  soul  and  mind, 
and  when  they  marched  down  the  streets  of  Grand 
Villars,  clothed  in  khaki,  they  looked  like  one  solid 
block  of  animated  invincible  bronze. 


118  Tit  For  Tat 

It  was  perfectly  natural  that  these  French  peo 
ple  should  take  this  first  sample  as  a  type  of  all 
Americans.  That  first  impression  of  the  "Arneri- 
cain"  became  fixed.  They  thought,  and  not  alto 
gether  incorrectly,  that  the  American  people  were 
of  many  varying  human  hues,  and  they  thought 
that  COLOR  predominated. 

They  also  thought,  perhaps  less  correctly,  that  all 
Americans  had  the  spirit  of  these  boys :  polite, 
gentle  to  women,  and  hearty  to  all  men.  The  most 
ordinary  peasant  woman  was  treated  by  these  col 
ored  soldiers  with  the  same  civility  which  they 
accorded  to  the  fashionable  French  women  of  the 
town.  A  colored  captain  says  that  he  would  see 
several  French  girls  with  water  buckets  on  their 
arms  and  pushing  baby  carriages  as  they  descend 
ed  the  hill  to  the  spring;  but  that  when  these  girls 
returned  from  the  spring,  each  bucket  would  be 
carried  and  each  baby  carriage  pushed  by  some  big 
stalwart  soldier  of  the  370th. 

The  people  of  Grand  Villars  thought  that  Amer 
ica  must  be  a  place  of  wonderful  democracy !  Curi 
ously  enough  the  colored  soldier  was  the  best  ally 
of  Woodrow  Wilson,  and  caused  the  French  people 
to  believe  the  words  that  emanated  from  the  White 
House. 

Naturally  the  whole  town,  men,  women  and  chil 
dren,  took  this  regiment  right  into  its  heart ;  no 
door  was  closed  to  them;  nothing  was  for  them 
too  good  or  quite  good  enough.  As  they  anchored 


Tit  For  Tat  119 

the  hopes  of  the  French  by  their  soldierly  bearing, 
so  also  did  they  gladden  the  hearthsides  with  their 
tales  and  songs.  The  girls  were  charmed  when 
the  colored  boys  exhibited  the  photographs  and  ex 
tolled  the  fine  points  of  "the  browns"  they  had  left 
behind. — Well,  as  long  as  man  is  man,  there  will 
always  arise  out  of  such  agreeable  society  what 
arose  here — genuine  love.  The  people  loved  these 
boys,  and  these  boys  loved  the  people. 

And  then  it  happened.  A  white  American  regi 
ment  came  and  encamped  five  miles  from  Grand 
Villars.  These  soldiers  of  one  monotonous  hue, 
were  less  attractive  to  strangers  than  the  vari 
colored  men  of  the  370th.  Then,  too,  they  were 
not  so  polite ;  they  were  colder  to  the  men,  and 
more  assuming  and  direct  among  the  women  and 
girls.  They  did  not  say  so  evenly  to  rich  and 
poor  alike  the  euphonious  French  "good  morning" 
and  "good  evening," — bonjour  and  bonsoir!  And 
when  these  white  Americans  went  into  the  homes 
of  the  people,  after  chatting  awhile  with  the  young 
ladies,  they  might  notice  on  the  table  the  photo 
graph  of  a  brown  or  black  soldier :  "What  is  this  ?" 

A  girl  would  reply:  "O,  Monsieur,  that  is  my 
John  or  (Sam,  or  Jake,  or  whatever  happened 
to  be  the  name  of  that  particular  member  of  the 
370th),  mon  bon  ami!"  (my  beau). 

Then  hostilities  began. 

"Your  zvhat?  Why,  don't  you  know  that  no  white 
person  ever  associates  with  them  in  America?  They 


120  Tit  For  Tat 

are  not  allowed  to  enter  our  homes  or  to  speak  to 
any  white  woman.  When  a  white  woman  in  the 
United  States  just  speaks  to  one  of  those  fellows, 
all  other  white  people  shut  her  out  of  their  homes 
and  never  speak  to  her  again !" 

The  white  fellows  very  naturally  kid  it  on  a 
little  thick,  in  their  efforts  to  cause  the  puzzled 
French  listeners  to  grasp  the  significance  of  this 
peculiar  thing. 

"They  are  not  Americans ;  they  are  just  niggers. 
We  only  allow  them  to  live  in  our  country  because 
their  people  were  once  slaves  there.  But  they  are 
not  American  citizens  and  are  not  even  allowed 
to  talk  back  to  white  people.  And  they  are  very 
criminal  and  dishonest;  they  will  steal.  They  are 
especially  dangerous  to  women :  in  our  country  no 
white  woman  dares  to  go  near  them  unless  a  white 
man  is  with  her." 

And  just  like  most  falsehoods,  right  there  is 
where  it  over-shot  the  mark  and  laid  the  foundation 
for  its  own  undoing ;  for  the  girls  of  the  house  might 
be  seen  to  look  at  each  other,  indicating  that  they 
themselves  knew  this  last  to  be  false.  But  in  spite 
of  their  own  experiences  with  these  brown  boys, 
they  were  somewhat  disturbed  by  this  brazen  at 
tack.  Human  nature  can  hardly  trust  itself.  We 
are  all  more  or  less  at  the  mercy  of  what  we  hear, 
— until  we  begin  to  confer.  So,  when  the  girls  of 
the  town  would  gather  in  little  groups,  one  would 
break  the  ice  with  a  whisper :  "Those  new  Ameri- 


Tit  For  Tat  121 

cans  tell  me  that  my  John  is  bad."  Then  other 
girls  would  pipe  in : 

"And  they  told  mama  that  my  Sam  is  bad." — 
"And  they  tell  father  that  my  Bill  is  bad."— "And 
they  say  that  mine  is  bad." — "And  mine." 

And  strange  to  say,  the  very  unanimity  of  the 
report  raised  the  first  confident  doubt  of  it;  and 
more  than  one  Avould  remark:  "Well,  it  must  be  a 
falsehood,  for  it  is  impossible  that  they  alt  should  be 
bad!"  Such  is  the  training  of  the  French  mind  that 
it  could  only  think  of  goodness  or  badness  as  be 
longing  to  individuals,  and  could  not  attach  a  moral 
idea  to  race  or  color.  They  could  not  grasp  the 
idea  of  a  bad  race,  and  they  thought  of  worth  or 
unworth  as  an  individual  characteristic. 

After  getting  this  encourgement  from  each  other, 
the  girls  began  to  confide  the  matter  to  their  col 
ored  friends. 

The  colored  boys  then  got  their  heads  together, 
and  in  strict  compliance  with  the  laws  of  human 
nature,  they  began  to  plan  for  defense  and  counter 
attack.  A  strategem  was  conceived  by  one  of  their 
lieutenants  and  he  proposed  to  call  all  the  girls  and 
women  of  Grand  Villars  to  assemble  in  convention 
and  hear  a  speech  from  him.  When  the  summons 
went  forth,  the  whole  town  came  out.  For  be 
cause  of  the  good  behavior  of  their  men,  the  of 
ficers  of  the  370th  regiment  literally  "owned  the 
town." 

The  lieutenant  took  the  platform.    He  had  grown 


122  Tit  For  Tat 

up  in  New  Orleans  and  could  speak  excellent 
French.  And  this  is  the  barage  which  he  laid  down 
against  the  attacking  enemy : 

"Women  and  girls  of  Grand  Villars :  We  regret 
to  find  it  necessary  to  give  you  fair  warning.  You 
have  seen  for  yourselves  that  the  soldiers  who  are 
encamped  near  this  village  are  not  real  Americans, 
altho  they  are  enlisted  in  the  American  Army. 
Americans  are  polite:  they  are  not.  Americans  are 
cordial:  they  are  cold.  Americans  are  gentle:  they 
are  rough.  Americans  are  democratic :  these  men 
are  snobbish.  Americans  respect  alike  the  hon 
orable  rich  and  the  honest  poor :  these  men  wor 
ship  money  but  respect  nobody.  Americans  do  not 
like  to  disparage  their  fellow  countrymen  or  their 
comrades-in-arms :  these  men  have  tried  without 
cause  to  slander  us.  Americans  are  brave :  these 
men  are  not  brave,  for  they  do  not  face  us,  but 
they  attack  us  in  secret  to  you. 

"Now  it  is  my  painful  duty  to  tell  you  who  these 
men  are.  Without  protest  we  allow  them  to  live 
in  our  country,  but  they  hate  us.  We  are  just  to 
them  and  treat  them  as  men, — as  equals  before  the 
law;  but  they  are  unjust  to  us  and  assume  an  at 
titude  of  natural  superiority.  Many  of  them  are 
descendants  of  the  German  and  the  Austrian,  and 
have  much  of  the  old  arrogance  of  their  fore 
fathers.  Because  of  their  conduct  we  do  not  as 
sociate  with  them  in  our  country,  and  we  do  not 


Tit  For  Tat  123 

call  them  Americans :  we  call  them — er —  'crackers' 
and  'pecks' !" 

That  was  a  finisher.  The  soldiers  of  the  five- 
mile  camp  were  chagrined  and  "stung"  to  find  the 
private  doors  of  Grand  Villars  tightly  closed  to 
them,  while  the  370th  enjoyed  greater  hospitality 
than  ever  before.  It  was  a  pitiable  sight, — this 
complete  and  sincere  ostricism  of  the  haughty  and 
the  proud.  It  was  a  heavy  dose  of  their  own  medi 
cine, — the  most  terrible  thing  that  could  be  offered 
them.  If  any  treatment  could  cure  a  man.  it 
should  be  that.  True  to  their  sympathetic  nature, 
the  colored  boys  became  really  sorry  for  the  white 
boys,  when  they  saw  them  in  groups  on  the  street 
corners,  looking  in  vain  for  society  and  sympathy, 
— and  sometimes  tarrying  so  late  that  the  military 
guard  would  have  to  order  them  out  at  the  g1ate. 
To  be  sure  they  could  visit  the  public  restaurants 
and  hotels ;  and  the  French  waitress,  when  she 
would  pass  a  table  where  a  colored  soldier  was 
seated,  would  stoop  low  and  whisper  (not  being 
able  to  remember  the  longer  epithet)  :  "There  are 

a  lot  of  those  Pecks  here  tonight." 
*****    * 

The  proof  that  our  race  prejudice  is  artificial, 
abnormal  and  rather  contrary  to  nature,  is  the  fact 
that  an  uninitiated  mind  like  that  of  the  French 
simply  cannot  "understand"  it.  It  was  comical  to 
see  them  trying  to  "get  it,"  when  the  white  Ameri 
can  was.  trying  to  explain.  Some  colored  soldiers 


124  Tit  For  Tat 

were  eating"  in  the  main  dining  room  of  an  hotel 
White  American  officers  entered,  and  seeing  a 
smaller,  less  elegant  dining  room  adjoining,  they 
called  the  proprietor  and  asked  him  to  put  the 
colored  soldiers  in  the  smaller  room,  explaining 
that  they  were  "not  fit"  to  eat  with  white  men, 
etc.  You  should  have  seen  the  face  of  this  be 
wildered  Frenchman,  as  he  endeavored  to  be  polite 
and  tried  at  the  same  time  to  square  his  common- 
sense  with  this  American  puzzle :  "Zhentlemen.  I 
do  not  understand.  These  other  zhentlemen  have 
paid  their  bills  and  they  are  polite,  and  you  say 
they  are  not  good  enough  to  eat  where  you  eat, — 
I  do  not  understand.  These  men  are  American 
soldiers  like  you  and  have  uniforms  like  you, — 
I  do  not  understand, — how  can  they  be  good  enough 
to  be  in  the  same  uniform  and  not  good  enough  to 
eat  in  the  same  room  ?  I  do  not  understand.  And, 
my  good  zhentlemen,  I  will  not  compel  you  to  eat 
with  the  other  zhentlemen, — the  little  dining  room 
is  open,  there  is  no  one  in  it.  why  don't  you  go 
into  it?  I  cannot  ask  the  others  to  move,  for  they 
are  satisfied.  You  are  dissatisfied, — why  should  I 
disturb  the  satisfied  one?  I  do  not  understand !" 

And  on  and  on  the  bewildered  Frenchman  plead 
before  this  inexorable  American  god.  Small  won 
der  it  is  that  the  average  white  American  soldier 
should  lose  some  of  his  ardor  for  France  after  such 
experiences.  He  was  a  puzzle  to  France,  and 
France  must  have  been  an  enigma  to  him. — Per- 


Tit  For  Tat  125 

haps  the  only  way  in  the  world  for  the  white 
American  ever  to  appreciate  this  demon  which  he 
worships,  is  to  have  a  chance  to  feel  the  full  weight 
of  his  rod,  as  did  the  white  soldiers  at  Grand  Villars. 
FINIS. 


